766 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



tion whenever it is necessary to fix a dog to tlie experimenting-table. 

 All physiologists, whenever it is possible, try to anaesthetize their vic- 

 tim with chloral, morphine, chloroform, or ether. When the ansestheti- 

 zation is completed, the animal does not suffer, and all the experiments 

 afterward made upon it are without cruelty. It is very rarely neces- 

 sary to experiment upon an animal that has not been treated with an 

 anaesthetic ; and even in these cases it is possible, by various pro- 

 cesses, to make the pain much less acute. I always endeavor to ame- 

 liorate the pains of the animals I subject to experiments. Yes, I have 

 caused rabbits, frogs, and dogs to suffer ; but I believe that never, 

 since I reached a man's age, have I taken pleasure in inflicting suffer- 

 ing upon a living being. For every animal, even the lowest, I feel 

 something analogous to pity and sympathy ; and I have a right to say 

 this, for there is no contradiction between such sympathy and physio- 

 logical experiment.* 



Instead of developing cruelty, the practice of physiology should 

 rather tend to increase in us the feeling of humanity and pity. The 

 physician who has closely observed human suffering, instead of being 

 hardened to it, becomes more compassionate. So the physiologists, 

 who are acquainted with pain, are full of pity for suffering beings, 

 and I do not hesitate to say that not one of them would be guilty of 

 brutality toward an animal. It is true that they immolate dogs and 

 rabbits, but that is for a superior interest ; and in their very experi- 

 ments they prove their clemency by trying to save their victims from 

 useless sufferings. 



In truth, if we divest ourselves of all vain sentimentality, we shall 

 arrive at the conclusion that innumerable and extreme sufferings are 

 already imposed by Nature upon living beings. Over the whole sur- 

 face of the earth, in Borneo as in France, in the Sahara as in Lapland, 

 men and animals are suffering. In the depths of all the seas, in the 

 currents of all the rivers, on all the shores of all the oceans, in all the 

 forests, and in all the plains, suffering and pain exist. Our object is 

 to bring in some mitigation for all these evils, and it can not be ac- 

 complished except by the aid of science, through becoming acquainted 

 with the laws of life. What then, compared to such a grand result, 

 are the confused groans of the unfortunate dogs we immolate from 

 time to time ? Indeed, we have a right to sacrifice these rare and inno- 

 cent victims, for at as small a price as that we can become masters of 

 living nature, and may be able to penetrate the laws of life, and to 

 relieve the unfortunate of our kind. — Translated for the Popular Sci- 

 ence Monthly from the Revice des Deux Mondes. 



* It is with great reluctance that we perform vivisections in public lectures for in- 

 struction. When the question is one of scientific research, the act must be performed 

 resolutely and without regard to the pain ; but, whenever the purpose is to demonstrate 

 before any audience a known phenomenon, the greatest reserve should be exercised in 

 the employment of means that are cruel. 



