1882 MB. DARWIN ON VIVISECTION 129 



Down, Beckenham, Kent : September 2, 1881. 



My dear Eomanes, — Your letter has perplexed me 

 beyond all measure. I fully recognise the duty of 

 everyone, whose opinion is worth anything, expressing 

 his opinion publicly on vivisection, and this made me 

 send my letter to the ' Times.' I have been thinking 

 at intervals all morning what I could say, and it is the 

 simple truth that I have nothing worth saying. You, 

 and men like you, whose ideas flow freely, and who can 

 express them easily, cannot understand the state of 

 mental paralysis in which I find myself. What is most 

 wanted is a careful and accurate attempt to show what 

 physiology has already done for man, and even still 

 more strongly what there is every reason to believe it 

 will hereafter do. Now I am absolutely incapable of 

 doing this, or of discussing the other points suggested 

 by you. 



If you wish for my name (and I should be glad 

 that it should appear with that of others in the same 

 cause), could you not quote some sentence from my 

 letter in the ' Times,' which I inclose, but please return 

 it ? If you thought fit you might say that you quoted 

 it with my approval, and that, after still further re- 

 flection, I still abide most strongly in my expressed 

 conviction. For Heaven's sake, do think of this ; I 

 do not grudge the labour and thought, but I could 

 write nothing worth anyone's reading. 



Allow me to demur to your calling your conjoint 

 article a ' symposium,' strictly a ' drinking-party ; ' 

 this seems to me very bad taste, and I do hope every- 

 one of you will avoid any semblance of a joke on the 



K 



