Individuality is the simplicity of a person. The simple is that which cannot be other than one. Individuality is like the number one. When one is divided, say by three, oneness still results, for one-third is still one. And one-seven hundred seventy-fourth (1/774) is still one.
Individuality is therefore like the electron, if the electron is considered as nothing but one, irreducible.
However, one is also an organization. We can think of one as to 886, making 1/886. But we can also think of one as 886/886 and, in fact, as 200/886 plus 3/886 plus 504/886 minus 2/886 plus 181/886. These numbers or fractions with their plus and minus, are one, just as one itself is.
Therefore, if a person is seen as doing many things, having many possibilities, losing, forgetting, altering, adding, remembering, desiring—that person is like one divided, added to, made fractions of, seen as having all kinds of combinations.
The unique, as such, is irreducible. It is or it isn’t. Therefore, individuality, as unique, is like the last point in matter, seen as matter, or like the last point in shape, seen as shape; or like the last point in matter-shape, seen as both.
Individuality, like oneness, can be seen as having inwardness. The fact that the number one can be seen with propriety as having in it 17/21 and 2/991; and the square root of 81 minus 8-7/21; and so on, means that it has a moving inwardness, an indefinite combination of interiority. Also, one can be seen as a fraction, put at its highest and largest, as 1/universe. If the universe is seen as an irreducible one, then we have one irreducible one as to another irreducible one.
The self, as individuality, can be divided in the way that one can. I can divide one by two, and have one-half. However, leaving aside the two in the fraction, we have, as I said, one still. For one-half is, as I said earlier, the whole, or one, of halfness; and one-seventh is the whole, or one, of seventhness.
Therefore, an individuality can deprive itself of something and still be an individual. If a person loses his leg, he is still an individual. If he loses his memory, or a large part of it, he is still an individual. If he contracts himself, or separates himself, he is still an individual. A split personality can be seen as ½ a personality or ½ plus ½ a personality, or 1 minus 1½ a personality; in every instance, there is still oneness.
However, though one aspect of one is its possibility, like that of the amoeba, of being divided and still retaining oneness, there is the other aspect of oneness: wholeness. The wholeness of one is not only towards division, but towards addition and multiplication; while, yet, it remains one.
The human body, alive, and having individuality, is a one made up of, organized of, many things; just as the number one can be seen as an organization. Every phase or organ or constituent of the human body can be seen as of the oneness or individuality of that body.
Were there not parts or organs or phases of the self, the self could not be. The self is like One as One, and also as 17 minus 4 plus 6 minus 2 minus 16 times 1. One is an endless diversity, and so is individuality.
One depends for its existence on the idea of nothing, for one means one more than nothing. And further, a person can say one zero or one nothing; for once zero or nothing is seen, oneness can be given to it.
Other things compared to the individuality are as not-individuality to individuality; and this is as nothing of that individuality to something of that individuality, or all of that individuality. The life of an individuality depends on what it does with that which is not it. The combination of not-individuality with individuality, seen at once, or instantaneously, is like the combination of matter and shape, matter and force in the electron, substance and form in art.