AN EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY VIVISECTOR
English literature during the eighteenth century presents no more
distinguished name than that of Dr. Samuel Johnson, the lexicographer
and essayist. His learning was immense; his judgments and criticisms
were everywhere regarded with respect; and, above other great men of
his time, he was fortunate in having as friend and companion one who
produced the best biography that the world has ever known.
Dr. Johnson's views of vivisection and vivisectors appeared as a
contribution to the Idler, on August 5, 1761, more than a hundred
years before the date given by Professor Bowditch as that of "THE
FIRST SERIOUS ATTACK UPON BIOLOGICAL RESEARCH IN ENGLAND." It may,
nevertheless, be doubted whether any attack more "serious" or protest
more weighty was ever made than was written by the most eminent
literary man of his time, a century and a half ago.
"Among the inferior professors of medical knowledge is a race of
wretches whose lives are only varied by varieties of cruelty; whose
favourite amusement is to nail dogs to tables and open them alive; to
try how long life may be continued in various degrees of mutilation,
or with the excision or laceration of vital parts; to examine whether
burning irons are felt more acutely by the bone or tendon; and whether
the more lasting agonies are produced by poison forced into the mouth
or injected into the veins. It is not without reluctance that I
offend the sensibility of the tender mind with images like these. If
such cruelties were not practised, it were to be desired that they
should not be conceived; but since they are published every day with
ostentation, let me be allowed once to mention them, since I mention
them with abhorrence.... The anatomical novice tears out the living
bowels of an animal, and styles himself a `physician'; prepares
himself by familiar cruelty for that profession which he is to
exercise upon the tender and helpless, upon feeble bodies and broken
minds, and by which he has opportunities to extend his arts and
tortures, and continue those experiments upon Infancy and Age which he
has hitherto tried upon cats and dogs. What is alleged in defence of
these hateful practices, everyone knows; but the truth is that by
knives and fire knowledge is not always sought, and is very seldom
attained. I know not that by living dissections any discovery has
been made by which a single malady is more easily cured. And if the
knowledge of physiology has been somewhat increased, he surely buys
knowledge dear who learns the use of the lacteals at the expense of
his own humanity. IT IS TIME THAT A UNIVERSAL RESENTMENT AGAINST
THESE HORRID OPERATIONS SHOULD ARISE, which tend to harden the heart,
and make the physician more dreadful than the gout or the stone."
A more vigorous denunciation of the cruelty of vivisection never
appeared than these words of the first scholar of the English-
speaking world. Of course the plea will be put forth that in
Dr. Johnson's time the use of anaesthetics was unknown. Are we, then,
to conclude that the present-day defenders of absolute freedom in
animal research would join him in condemning the perpetrators of ALL
EXPERIMENTS CAUSING DISTRESS IN WHICH ANAESTHETICS CANNOT BE EMPLOYED?
For the merit of Dr. Johnson's plea lies in this, THAT HE MAKES
ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS OF HIGHER IMPORTANCE THAN THE DISCOVERY OF
PHYSIOLOGICAL FACTS. "If the knowledge of physiology has been somewhat
increased, he surely buys knowledge dear who learns the use of the
lacteals at the expense of his own humanity." Is there a physiological
defenders of vivisection-freedom living to-day who would accept
Dr. Johnson's conclusion, that one should forbear research which is
possible only by the infliction of animal torment? How unfair it is,
therefore, to suggest that the force of Dr. Johnson's argument is
invalidated because anaesthetics were unknown--when the disagreement
is infinitely deeper!
To what physiologists of his time did Dr. Johnson allude? Apparently
his denunciation was sweeping; he referred to "a race of wretches"
rather than to any particular individual, and to experiments then
carried on and "published every day with ostentation." Who were the
men thus stigmatized? We do not know. The record of their useless
tormenting has sunk into the oblivion that hides their names; there
are but one or two whose identity may perhaps be guessed. It is
possible that one of them was John Hunter; yet Hunter did not go up to
London until 1764, and Dr. Johnson's condemnation had appeared three
years earlier. Still, this does not preclude the possibility that
Dr. Johnson had Hunter in his mind.
In some ways John Hunter was a remarkable man. He made an anatomical
collection, which is still in existence and which bears his name. At
Earl's Court, then a suburb of London, he established a sort of
zoological Inferno, that reminds one of the "Island of Dr. Moreau."
One of his biographers, Ottley, tells us that Hunger "TOOK SUPREME
DELIGHT" in his physiological experiments; and inasmuch as he
suggested in a letter to a friend the performance of the most
agonizing experiments as likely to "amuse" him, the statement was
undoubtedly true. A man's occupation generally has an influence upon
his character, and Hunter's biographer rather hesitatingly admits that
"he was not always very nice in his choice of associates," and that
among his companions were certain abominable wretches known as
"resurrection men," who robbed graveyards for the benefit of students
of anatomy. Under all circumstances, we can hardly be surprised that
his married life was anything but serene.
In the infliction of pain he seems to have been without any idea of
pity. To a friend who asked for his experience in a certain matter,
he wrote:
"I thank you for your experiment on the hedgehog; but WHY DO YOU ASK
ME A QUESTION, by the way of solving it? I think your solution is
just, but why--WHY NOT TRY THE EXPERIMENT? Repeat all the experiments
upon a hedgehog as soon as you receive this, and they will give you
the solution. TRY THE HEAT. CUT OFF A LEG...and let me know the
result of the whole.
"Ever yours,
"JOHN HUNTER."
Even his own word, or the result of his own observations, he did not
wish to have accepted, when, merely at the cost of another tortured
animal, his friend could find the answer for himself. Is not this the
physiological ideal of to-day?
Again he writes to his scientific friend:
"If you could make some experiments on the increased heat of
inflammation, I should be obliged to you.... I opened the thorax of a
dog between two ribs, and introduced the thermometer. Then I put some
lint into the wound to keep it from healing by the first intention,
THAT THE THORAX MIGHT INFLAME; but before I had time to try it again,
my dog died on the fourth day. A deep wound might be made into the
thick of a dog's thigh, then put in the thermometer and some
extraneous matter.... IF THESE EXPERIMENTS WILL AMUSE YOU, I should be
glad they were made; but take care you do not break your thermometer
in the dog's chest."[1]
[1] Barron's "Life of Jenner," i. 44.
"IF THESE EXPERIMENTS WILL AMUSE YOU"--what a suggestive confirmation
of Dr. Johnson's charge that the torture of vivisection was then
regarded as an "amusement"! A century after, an Italian physiologist,
Mantegazza, devoted a year to the infliction of extreme torment upon
animals, and confessed that his tortures were inflicted, not with
hesitation or repugnance, but "CON MULTO AMORE," with extreme
delight.[2]
[2] "Fisiolgia del Dolore di Paulo Mantegazza," pp. 101-107.
Hunter does not seem to have regarded his own experiments other than
as an intellectual pastime. Mr. Stephen Paget, in his work on "Animal
Experimentation," refers to "one great experiment...that puts him
[Hunter] on a line with Harvey"--an experiment upon a deer in Richmond
Park. There is no reason for doubting that such an experiment may
have been made; but the curious thing is, that it rests only on verbal
tradition, for in his surgical lectures treating of aneurism Hunter
has not a word to say of the experiment which now, we are told, "links
his name with that of Harvey," who made known the circulation of the
blood. His biographer, Ottley, referring to his surgical operation
for aneurism, tell us that "he was led to propose the improved method,
in consequence of the frequent failure of the operation by the old
mode." No reference whatever is made to the legendary experiment on
the stag in Richmond Park.[1]
[1] Ottley's "Life of Hunter," p. 97.
Of other experiments by Hunter we know more. Sometimes his
observations were of a character that illustrates his environment. In
his "Observations" Hunter tells us that at one time, on going to bed
at night, he "observed bugs, marching down the curtains and head of
the bed; of those killed, NONE had blood in them." In the morning "I
have observed them marching back, and all such were found FULL OF
BLOOD!"[2] A wonderful discovery for a philosopher to record, leaving
unmentioned the one experiment and observation by which his fame is to
be linked with that of Harvey!
[2] Letter to Ottley, "Life," p. 89.
Hunter had erroneous views on various matters of science. He believed
that there was "no such thing as a primary colour, every colour being
a mixture of two, making a third." He tells us that he once formed a
theory that if a human being were completely frozen, "life might be
prolonged a thousand years, he might learn what had happened during
his frozen condition."[3] His biographer, Ottley, alludes to this
theory of Hunter's as "a project which, if realized, he expected would
make his fortune."[4] With this not altogether admirable object in
view, his experiments upon freezing animals were doubtless made. A
dormouse, confined in a cold mixture, he tells us, "showed signs of
great uneasiness; sometimes it would curl itself into round form to
preserve its extremities and confine the heat, and finding that
ineffectual, would then endeavor to escape." Its feet were at last
frozen, but Hunter could not freeze the entire animal because of the
protection afforded by the hair. How should the scientist overcome
this difficulty? He pondered over the problem; then made a dormouse
completely wet over, and placed it in the freezing-mixture. The
wretched animal "made repeated attempts to escape," but without avail,
and finally became quote stiff. Alas, for the grand "fortune"!
Hunter tells us that "on being thawed, it was found quite dead!"[1]
[3] "Lectures," i. 284.
[4] Ottley's "Life of Hunter," p. 57.
[1] Hunter's Works, vol. iv., p. 133.
The influence of Hunter upon English biology was undoubtedly very
great. In a mean and sordid society, he was an enthusiast for the
acquisition of knowledge, and while his passion for physiology
induced--as it so often does--an indifference regarding the infliction
of pain, his pitiless vivisections were not more cruel than
experiments made in this twentieth century, and some of them by men of
national reputation. He was the type of the class of experimenters
whom Dr. Johnson had in his mind, men whose long practice in the
infliction of torment creates an indifference to the ordinary emotions
of humanity, so that even in the causation of agony they find
something "to amuse," and in the performance of the most painful
vivisection an occasion for "supreme delight."