478 the president's address. 



integration amongst individuals of successively higher orders 

 constitute some of the most important factors by means of which 

 organic evolution is carried on, and that at each successive stage 

 of progressive integration a new individuality is acquired, the 

 organism entering into possession of new attributes that are 

 something very much more than the mere sum of the attributes 

 possessed by its constituent units. 



Individuality, though a very real phenomenon, is a very 

 elusive one, and one which perhaps lies outside the legitimate 

 domain of the biologist. We can do little more than collect 

 the remarkable facts that confront us so frequently in the course 

 of our investigations, and hand them over to the philosophers 

 to deal with as best they can. How far the philosophers will 

 agree that progressive evolution consists to a very large extent 

 in the gradual merging of individualities of a_ lower order in 

 others of a higher order I do not know, but to myself as 

 a biologist this generalisation appears to hold a large measure 

 of truth. 



Journ. Quekett Microscopical Club, Ser. 2, Vol. XII., No. 76, April 1915. 



