Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 8.djvu/640

 620 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

especially the monera and the rhizopods, the salient character of conformation, according to Hackel, is

the invariably totally inferior development of their individuality. Numbers of protesta are, during their life, simple plastids, individuals of a primary order. Others, by combining together, form colonies of plastids. But even these individuals, although somewhat superior, remain for the most part at a very inferior degree of development. The inhabitants of these communities of plastids invariably resemble each other very much ; with them there is only a very slight division of labor ; consequently, their social organism is as incapable of elevated functions as that of the savages of New Holland. Besides, the union of the plastids is ordinarily very loose, and each of them always retains in a large measure its personal independence.

We observe that lack of individuality corresponds to a great personal independence, and that, with all living beings, social progress can, therefore, naturally be conceived as coincident with the development of individuality parallel to increasing solidarity. In spite of appearances to the contrary, individuality and solid- arity are not contradictory, but the latter is the condition, the support, of the former.

At first sight it seems that the limits of morphological varia- tions in the organic world are less precise than in the inorganic world. In contrast with crystals, the animal and vegetable forms appear to exclude all geometrical determination. They are ordi- narily limited by curved surfaces intersecting in curved lines and at variable angles. Even from the point of view of geometrical lines, however, the radiolaria and many other protista are not different from crystals. Their forms may likewise be reduced to definite mathematical forms, limited by constant, measurable surfaces and angles. There are even absolutely amorphous organisms, like the monera, the amoeba, which change their forms at each instant. Their forms are as indefinite as those of amor- phous inorganisms, uncrystallized rocks, precipitates, etc., whose structure is nevertheless determined by the most general laws of mechanics. In general, however, every organic structure is lim- ited. Every structure, in its double aspect of mass-limit, is in a constant equilibration with the environment which furnishes the materials that enter into its composition and support its activity. There is this difference, that in every vegetable or animal organ-