222 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. IX. No. 215. 



ists are to be regarded as antics, or as the idiotic 

 spot upon tlie brain of many people, tlie writer 

 laclced wisdom in urging that men of science, 

 thus far only cognizant at second hand of the 

 points at issue, should divest themselves of the 

 bias of esprit- de -corps, and, emerging from the 

 influences exerted upon them by a sub-division 

 of their colleagues, decide, through their own 

 investigation, for or against experiments on liv- 

 ing animals. 



In the writer's opinion, however, not fully 

 expressed in the number of Science referred to, 

 the adequate hearing, which has not been, 

 should be given to the allegations of the anti- 

 vivisectionists, namely : (1) That the experi- 

 ments have not helped medical or scientific 

 knowledge. (2) That the experiments are not 

 properly restrained, and can be pursued in the 

 United States not only by scientific men, but 

 by tyros, or by others in an undue, excessive 

 and superficial manner. (3) That whether to 

 the advantage of scientific knowledge or not, 

 the practice of painful experiment on unwilling 

 living creatures, by a human mind aware of the 

 significance of pain upon the higher animals, is 

 an act founded on no right and degrading to 

 that human mind. 



lu the latter allegation, passing by here the 

 two preceding it, the writer sees the real issue. 

 Denying such tendency of the experiment on 

 the experimenter, seeming willing to leave to 

 the latter his present unrestricted latitude, the 

 advocate of vivisection, apparently under sanc- 

 tion of the National Academy of Sciences, as- 

 serts not only an excuse, but a right for the ex- 

 periments in their alleged advantage to science 

 and the human race. 



This is to fortify the practice in one of the 

 strongest ways possible, since the thought trend 

 of the human majority makes naturally toward 

 a magnification of its own successes, and a jus- 

 tification of the latter even when demonstrably 

 achieved at the expense of insignificant and un- 

 voiced suflTering. The right of communities to 

 advantage (amuse) themselves by human pain 

 still exists among certain savage and barbarous 

 peoples. The right of nations, proceeding, for 

 their own alleged advantage, to practice felony 

 and murder (according to their rule laid down 

 for individuals), to act frequently upon the 



abused precepts of Machiavelli, while proclaim- 

 ing Christianity, is not potently questioned 

 throughout Christendom, while the notion of 

 restraining the alleged rights of civilized com- 

 munities and individuals to advantage (amuse) 

 themselves by the infliction of great pain on 

 lower forms of life has entered the heads of but 

 few of those thus advantaged. Nevertheless, 

 some ameliorations have been made in certain 

 cases towards the alleviation of the pain, which 

 has been supposed to confer the benefit upon its 

 inflictor, and the attempt of the human friend 

 of animals, in this instance, to set limits to the 

 gains of humanity is not more unreasonable 

 than the existence of certain limits already set 

 by humanity itself to its own gains. 



When human public opinion forbids by law 

 the practice of forcible vivisection upon a felon 

 condemned to death, it limits the advance of 

 scientific knowledge by ruling off the dissect- 

 ing table a class of fiber and tissue more val- 

 uable for medical study, while not demonstrably 

 more significant to the community, than the 

 fiber and tissue of a dog. If we forbid the 

 hypnotist to learn by experiment upon the hu- 

 man subject, whether the latter can be mes- 

 merically influenced to steal, commit adultery, 

 lie, or otherwise yield to inborn passions, we 

 again obstruct science. When society denies 

 the right of doctors to test theories and modes 

 of treatment, or to advance scientific knowledge, 

 by occasionally killing or paining moribund hu- 

 man patients in hospitals, it retards scientific 

 knowledge by limiting a class of experiment 

 more valuable to the experimenter than similar 

 inflictions by analogy upon animals. At the 

 same time the restraint acts upon a principle no 

 more logical, no less so, than that which moves 

 the anti-vivisectionist. 



But in its deeper sense the late movement in 

 defense of animals justifies itself not in logic, 

 which has not yet solved the mystery of pain, 

 torture and death, but rather in the expansion 

 of the very potent principle of love or sym- 

 pathy. 



Raising clearly and fully a momentous ques- 

 tion which, it is to be regretted. Science did not 

 honor herself by raising for them, the defenders 

 of animals proclaim that the whole question of 

 the ravages of Homo sapiens (who seems to have 



