imate"; while fruits and herbs, and even inconspicuous
animals, such as house-flies, maggots, lemmings, sheep, are not
ordinarily apprehended as "animate" except when taken collectively.
As here used the term does not necessarily imply an indwelling soul or
spirit. The concept includes such things as in the apprehension of the
animistic savage or barbarian are formidable by virtue of a real or
imputed habit of initiating action. This category comprises a large
number and range of natural objects and phenomena. Such a distinction
between the inert and the active is still present in the habits of
thought of unreflecting persons, and it still profoundly affects the
prevalent theory of human life and of natural processes; but it does not
pervade our daily life to the extent or with the far-reaching practical
consequences that are apparent at earlier stages of culture and belief.

To the mind of the barbarian, the elaboration and utilisation of what is
afforded by inert nature is activity on quite a different plane from his
dealings with "animate" things and forces. The line of demarcation may
be vague and shifting, but the broad distinction is sufficiently real
and cogent to influence the barbarian scheme of life. To the class of
things apprehended as animate, the barbarian fancy imputes an unfolding
of activity directed to some end. It is this teleological unfolding of
activity that constitutes any object or phenomenon an "animate" fact.
Wherever the unsophisticated savage or barbarian meets with activity
that is at all obtrusive, he construes it in the only terms that are
ready to hand--the terms immediately given in his consciousness of his
own actions. Activity is, therefore, assimilated to human action, and
active objects are in so far assimilated to the human agent. Phenomena
of this character--especially those whose behaviour is notably
formidable or baffling--have to be met in a different spirit and with
proficiency of a different kind from what is required in dealing with
inert things. To deal successfully with such phenomena is a work of
exploit rather than of industry. It is an assertion of prowess, not of
diligence.

Under the guidance of this naive discrimination between the inert and
the animate, the activities of the primitive social group tend to fall
into two classes, which would in modern phrase be called exploit and
industry. Industry is effort that goes to create a new thing, with a
new purpose given it