*A letter written to Philip G. Peabody. May 27, 1800.
VIVISECTION is the Inquisition--the Hell--of Science.
All the cruelty which the human--or rather the inhuman--heart is capable
of inflicting, is in this one word. Below this there is no depth. This
word lies like a coiled serpent at the bottom of the abyss.
We can excuse, in part, the crimes of passion. We take into
consideration the fact that man is liable to be caught by the whirlwind,
and that from a brain on fire the soul rushes to a crime. But
what excuse can ingenuity form for a man who deliberately--with an
unaccelerated pulse--with the calmness of John Calvin at the murder
of Servetus--seeks, with curious and cunning knives, in the living,
quivering flesh of a dog, for all the throbbing nerves of pain? The
wretches who commit these infamous crimes pretend that they are working
for the good of man; that they are actuated by philanthropy; and that
their pity for the sufferings of the human race drives out all pity for
the animals they slowly torture to death. But those who are incapable
of pitying animals are, as a matter of fact, incapable of pitying men.
A physician who would cut a living rabbit in pieces--laying bare the
nerves, denuding them with knives, pulling them out with forceps--would
not hesitate to try experiments with men and women for the gratification
of his curiosity.
To settle some theory, he would trifle with the life of any patient
in his power. By the same reasoning he will justify the vivisection of
animals and patients. He will say that it is better that a few animals
should suffer than that one human being should die; and that it is far
better that one patient should die, if through the sacrifice of that
one, several may be saved.
Brain without heart is far more dangerous than heart without brain.
Have these scientific assassins discovered anything of value? They may
have settled some disputes as to the action of some organ, but have they
added to the useful knowledge of the race?
It is not necessary for a man to be a specialist in order to have and
express his opinion as to the right or wrong of vivisection. It is not
necessary to be a scientist or a naturalist to detest cruelty and to
love mercy. Above all the discoveries of the thinkers, above all the
inventions of the ingenious, above all the victories won on fields of
intellectual conflict, rise human sympathy and a sense of justice.
I know that good for the human race can never be accomplished by
torture. I also know that all that has been ascertained by vivisection
could have been done by the dissection of the dead. I know that all the
torture has been useless. All the agony inflicted has simply hardened
the hearts of the criminals, without enlightening their minds.
It may be that the human race might be physically improved if all the
sickly and deformed babes were killed, and if all the paupers, liars,
drunkards, thieves, villains, and vivisectionists were murdered. All
this might, in a few ages, result in the production of a generation
of physically perfect men and women; but what would such beings be
worth,--men and women healthy and heartless, muscular and cruel--that is
to say, intelligent wild beasts?
Never can I be the friend of one who vivisects his fellow-creatures. I
do not wish to touch his hand.
When the angel of pity is driven from the heart; when the fountain of
tears is dry,--the soul becomes a serpent crawling in the dust of a
desert.