The primitive instincts of man were for a long time vaguely and loosely defined, until James and later McDougall essayed to give them name and number. But only with Thorndike's critical examination has it become clear how difficult a thing it is to carry the analysis of any situation back to the elemental or "primal movers of all human activity." Thorndike is satisfied to describe them as nothing save a set of original tendencies to respond to stimuli in more or less definite directions. When he speaks of instincts it is to mean only a "series of situations and responses" or "a set of tendencies for various situations to arouse the feelings of fear, anger, pity, _etc._ with which certain bodily movements usually go." Among them, there are those resulting in "food-getting and habitation," in "fear, fighting and anger" and in "human intercourse."[47] But McDougall's classification preserves the old phrases, and men are likely to go on speaking of the "instinct of flight," the "instinct of pugnacity," "parental instinct," "gregarious instinct" and the others.[48] For the sociologist it is enough that all agree that men are held under some powerful grip of nature and driven at times almost inevitably to the doing of acts quite irrespective of their social effects. [47] Thorndike, Edward L., _The Original Nature of Man_ (N. Y., 1913), ch. v, p. 43 _et seq._ [48] McDougall, William, _An Introduction to Social Psychology_ (Boston, 1917), ch. iii, p. 49 _et seq._ In catastrophe these primitive instincts are seen most plainly and less subject to the re-conditioning influences of ordinary life. This was especially noticeable at Halifax. The instinct of flight for self-preservation was reflected in the reaction of thousands. "Almost without thought, probably from the natural instinct of self-preservation I backed from the window to a small store-room and stood there dazed."[49] The experience so described may be said to have been general. This instinct was to be seen again in the action of the crew of the explosives-laden ship. Scarcely had the collision occurred when the whole complement lowered away the boats, rowed like madmen to the nearest shore--which happened to be that opposite to Halifax--and "scooted for the woods." As the ship, although set on fire immediately after the impact, did not actually blow up until some twenty minutes later, much might have been done by men less under the domination of instinct, in the way of warning and perhaps of minimizing the inevitable catastrophe.[50] [49] Sheldon, J., _The Busy East_ (Sackville, N. B. Can.), March, 1918. [50] The judgment of the court of enquiry ran as follows: "The master and pilot of the Mont Blanc are guilty of neglect of public safety in not taking proper steps to warn the inhabitants of the city of a probable explosion." (Drysdale Commission, _Judgment of_, sec. viii.)