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-fish or a star-fish is capable 
of feeling pain. I submit that there is no such 
ground. The mere fact that the animals are alive 
constitutes no such 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 
any one 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 
boiling them alive. 
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, 
