THEORIES OF INDIVIDUALITY 49 



viduation, but it is probable that some real or apparent 

 individuations which arise temporarily or are persistent 

 in the cell approach more nearly the inorganic than 

 the organic kind. Nevertheless, wherever a region of 

 high metaboKc rate arises in protoplasm, there some 

 degree of organic individuation arises, at least for the 

 time being, provided relations already existing do not 

 interfere with or inhibit the establishment of a metabolic 

 gradient. 



According to the dynamic conception organic indi- 

 viduality results in the final analysis from the relations 

 between living protoplasm and the world external to it. 

 If we accept this view we should expect to find morpho- 

 logical structure and differentiation making their first 

 appearance in the superficial regions of the protoplasmic 

 mass. These are in more direct relation with the 

 external world and therefore more irritable and with 

 the establishment of a region of high metabolic rate a 

 metabolic gradient must arise much more rapidly in the 

 superficial than in other regions. The facts agree well 

 with this view, for the first indications of individuation 

 in the organism are very generally superficial and in 

 many of the simpler forms, such as the infusoria among 

 animals, orderly morphological differentiation is always 

 limited to the superficial regions. The nervous system 

 is also superficial in origin. In the plant cells also the 

 superficial portions of the cytoplasm generally show a 

 higher degree of stability than other regions and are 

 apparently chiefly concerned in whatever morphological 

 protoplasmic differentiation occurs. If organic indi- 

 viduality is self-determined there is no apparent reason 

 for its appearance as a superficial phenomenon. 



