C. F. HODGE 35 



passing of the present phase of opposition to physiology. 

 The older science of anatomy was obliged to run the same 

 gauntlet of popular misunderstanding and prejudice in the 

 early part of the last century, when its students were com- 

 pelled to resort, indirectly, to grave-robbing to obtain 

 material for dissection. Massachusetts holds the proud 

 distinction of first legally acknowledging the value of this 

 science by passage of the Anatomy Act of 1831. And in 

 England, not until Burk had murdered in less than a year 

 sixteen persons to sell their bodies, was the Warberton Bill 

 for Regulating Schools of Anatomy passed in 1832. 



The discovery of truth and the progress of science is 

 something that no human legislation can stop. It is, on 

 the other hand, the one thing that all intelligent legislators 

 should seek to favor and foster in every possible way. And 

 this brings us to the point that I wish especially to make ; 

 viz., the value and importance of physiological science. 



In attendance on a number of hearings for the petition- 

 ers I have heard a great deal about the sufferings of ani- 

 mals, most of the cases being taken from foreign countries 

 and from the earlier part of the past century, and not a 

 word about the sufferings of human kind. On page 24 of 

 my paper, The Vivisection Question, I give carefully 

 gathered statistics of the number of animals used in Mas- 

 sachusetts during the year 1894-95 m a ll the institutions 

 of the State in which I could find that vivisection was 

 practised. I have not had the time, nor have I thought it 

 worth while, to collect similar statistics for the year 1899. 

 The result would be about the same. Compare with the 

 number of animals used, most of them painlessly (809, 

 aside from frogs), the 34,419 human beings who die annu- 

 ally of disease. (I do not include in this number deaths 

 from old age or accident.) How many of these are pain- 

 less? And we must add to this number at least four times 

 as many cases of non-fatal disease; 137,676 cases of sick- 



