INTRODUCTION. 7 



is to say, before convincing me of sin, it must be 

 shown that there is some reasonable ground for 

 supposing that a jelly-ti.sh or a star-fish is capable 

 of feeling pain. I submit that there is no such 

 ground. Tlie mere fact that the animals are alive 

 constitutes no sucli ground ; for the insectivorous 

 plants are also alive, and exhibit even more phy- 

 siological " sensitiveness " and capability of rapid 

 response to stimulation than is the case with the 

 animals which we are about to consider. And if 

 anyone should go so far as to object to Mr. Darwin's 

 experiments on these plants on account of its not 

 being demonstrable that the tissues did not suffer 

 under his operations, such a person is logically bound 

 to go still further, and to object on similar grounds 

 to the horrible cruelty of skinning potatoes and 



boilino* them alive. 



o « 



Thus, before any rational scruples can arise with 

 regard to the vivisection of a living organism, some 

 reasonable ground must be shown for supposing 

 that the organism, besides being living, is also 

 capable of suffering. But no such reasonable ground 

 can be shown in the case of these low animals. 

 We only know of such capability in any case 

 through the analogy based upon our own experi- 

 ence, and, if we trust to this analogy, we must con- 

 clude that the capability in question vanishes long 

 before we come to animals so low in the scale as 

 the jelly-fish or star-fish. For within the limits of 

 our own organism we have direct evidence that 

 nervous mechanisms, much more highly elaborated 

 than any of those which we are about to consider, 



