3 o o tf^ Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2012 with funding from Duke University Libraries http://www.archive.org/details/studyofphysiologOOcobb FOR THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS FROM VIVISECTION. THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY AS A BRANCH OF EDUCATION FBANCES POWER COB BE. Wv&axvs. Street Sarietg FOR THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS FROM VIVISECTION, United with the (Jnternat tonal .Association FOR THE TOTAL SUPPRESSION OF VIVISECTION, Offices:— 1, VICTORIA STREET, LONDON, S.W. Price 2d. It is a theme of literary gossip that the poet-laureate's Jk -^-^ — mantle will fall-em the shoulders of Lewis Morris shortly, \ I c^sY 1 U/tfYl owing to Lord Tennyson's increasing infirmities. The fol- lowing verses, therefore, may interest our readers, even be- | ~fx?fr\ Ty^\ ^^ yond the beauty and power found in the poet's lines : — In a German Laboratory. A most intelligent dog I took, Affectionate, full of caressing grace, With something of human love in his look, And such a trustful, half -human face. Had learnt tricks, too — would give you a paw Where a brother-man would offer a hand, Right or left, as you asked him ; could understand Your speech — it might almost fill one with awe. See how near to mankind, yet how T far These dumb and pitiful creatures are ; How all their faith and belief and love Is centred in Man as a Lord above. And looking into his eyes for awhile — For knowledge is precious and gained through pain — I bound him down with a pitying smile, And deftly removed the left lobe of his brain. And then, with all that I had of skill, I healed it again, so that presently, Though lame and sick, in his love for me The creature strove to obey my will. And when I asked him to give me a paw, He gave the left first, but when for the right I asked, his maimed brain failing him quite, Gave the left — and I thought I had touched on a Law. So I persevered, and the brute again, With a loving, sorrowful look of pain, Brought the left paw over the helpless right, And I marked the effort, with deep delight. And having pushed knowledge so far, again, I divided the opposite lobe of the brain, And the poor brute, though willing to offer a paw, Could no longer obey — and I grasped a Law. Later on, still athirst for knowledge, once more I carved the weak brain, as I did before, Till the poor dumb wretch, as he lay on his side, With a loving look regarding me. died. Poor brute ! he lies dead for knowledge, and I, If I grasp not the clue, yet I may by-and by. Strange how weak Man is, and infirm of will, For sometimes I see him and shudder still ! — Lewis Morris. PHYSIOLOGY AS A BRANCH OF EDUCATION. (Reprinted from The Zoophilist, July, 1883.) An interesting history might be written of Paideutics — of the different modes of training which in different ages and nations have been supposed to constitute a liberal educa- tion. The early Persian who was taught to " draw the bow and speak the truth ; " the j'oung Greek of the days of Pericles who practised athletics and studied music and geometry ; the Hebrew lad who learned to repeat by rote the wise sayings of departed Eabbis ; the French, or German, or English noble youth of the Middle ages, who learned the svvord exercise, and how to joust at tourna- ments, and did not learn how to read or to write ; our own grandsires, who spent their boyhood over Greek and Latin grammars and Euclid, and left their universities with honourable degrees, but in utter ignorance of modern languages, and of the simplest rudiments of natural science ; these would all figure as the fortunate possessor of what, in the eyes of their contemporaries, was the "best possible education." Of late years, as we all know, every sort of conceivable instruction has been industriously recommended and provided for students, rich and poor, male and female ; while oceans of ink have been expended in debating the relative utility of each order of study. Very naturally the pendulum has swung far in the direction opposite to that which it formerly took, and whereas for ages Literature was the grand aim of education only varied by Mathematics, in these days Physical Science bids fair to usurp the supreme place and become the great road, to distinction. As we have said the alteration is natural, especially in such an age of scientific triumphs as ours, and it pertains to do individual or college or even university, to turn back the current. But some cautions respecting the inordinate preference manifested in high educational quarters for natural science over literature and mathematics, may very pro- perly be taken to heart. In the first place if our ancestors attended too exclusively to Man and his affairs — his inner consciousness (on which they built metaphysics and theology), his history, his poetry, his art, — it must be borne in mind that in so doing they chose the nobler part of creation. It was a mistake to stop at that part and not bestow some study likewise on man's splendid planetary abode, its star- sown roof, its floor of geologic records, and the myriad denizens of its air and waters. But it would be a much greater mistake — and it is one wherewith we are seriously threatened, — to neglect that first half which concerns the heart and conscience and intellect of Man, and confine ourselves to the lower half which concerns material and animal nature. In more senses than one it is true that " the proper study of Mankind is Man." And again, the study of Literature was confessedly always a refining element. It proverbially " softened manners." The old world "scholar" was in a very high sense a "gentle- man." There is no particular reason to suppose that the study of the Physical Sciences will have a similar effect with the Litem Humaniores ; nay, there are symptoms that it will have an opposite one, and they will perhaps deserve to be called Scientice, Inhumaniores. Mr. Herbert Spencer himself, describes very clearly the mental limitations consequent on such pursuits,'" and bej'ond these the moralist may discern the production of a certain specific type of hardness, and arrogance which has developed itself in the ranks of Science, ever since science has ceased to be to its followers (what it was to the Keplers and Newtons, and Herschels, and Lyells of an earlier time) the highway to religion. But admitting that the physical sciences must form hence- forth a considerable part of a liberal education, and that con- * See Study of Sociology, p. 320. sequently our high schools and universities must make proper provision for teaching them, it may be reasonably asked : " Is there no distinction to be made between one science and another ? Are not some sciences better suited for mental training than others ?" If physical Science cannot suggest the same moral ideas, or present the same examples, or stir the moral pulses as History and Poetry do at every page, at least there are some which lift up and enlarge the mind, — as for example, by the contemplation of the stupendous magnitude and order of the material universe as taught by Astronomy, — or which solemnize it by the retrospection into the dim vistas of geologic epochs, — or entrance it by the beauty exhibited in the subjects of Botany and Zoology, — or illuminate it by the marvellous revelations of modern Physics and Chemistry. All these sciences may justly claim to possess, as methods of education, suitabilities to affect in a desirable direction the minds subjected to their influence. On them, therefore, it would surely behove the great educational institutions of the country to bestow their first care, and to endow Professorships, and build observatories, and museums, and laboratories for their pursuit. Above all, the noblest and most elevating science of all, Astronomy, should be richly provided for in every university ; and even in every high school and college throughout the country an effort ought to be made to provide by lectures, telescopes, and diagrams, for the instruction of students, at least in the results of discovery and the general outline of the science as now mapped out. But there is another and very different science much more in vogue at present than either Astronomy, Geology, or Physics, and on behalf of which the utmost efforts are being made in the two oldest universities of England. It is not a matter of small significance that in one and the same monthly issue we should be called on to record the foundation of the Balfour Studentship at Cambridge, and the allotment of £10,000 to build a Physiological Laboratory at Oxford. What are the claims of Physiology, we ask, to be thus fostered in the heart of English education, and offered as a worthy training to the youths who are to be the future 6 legislators, judges, clerg}', and men of letters of our country ? What is it expected to do for their minds and their hearts ? Will it ennoble them ? Will it refine ? Will it purify ? Will it in any conceivable way render them better men or better leaders of the future generation ? Putting aside altogether for the present the memory of the cruelties wherewith Physiology has stained herself (the record of which can scarcely now be separated from the teaching of the science, even should the teacher by any chance desire to keep them out of sight), we think there is very grave reason for believing that physiology is, not the first science which ought to be taught to the young and impressionable, but the very last wherewith the calm tem- perament and trained intellect of middle life may safely complete its circle. Of course it is possible to teach and to learn Physiology in a high and pure and religious spirit. But it is certainly more liable than any other science to be studied in an opposite one. It cannot be doubted that it has a distinct tendency to materialize the minds which pursue it ; to make the "physical analogue of every human feeling always the prominent idea to them, rather tban the spiritual fact of which the physical is the accompaniment. Whatever is most touching, most beautiful, most sacred in our nature, — the tear of pity ; the soul-speaking eye, the breast from which the infant draws its life, — these are, to the well-instructed physiologist, nothing more than " secretions " and " organs." " Tiens!" says Balzac's philosopher, when his wife weeps at his heartlessness, " Des larmes ! Mais j'ai decomposers les larmes," and he proceeds to give her an analysis of the salts and fluids constituting tears. Nature has veiled beneath her beautiful covering of skin her secret works of digestion, absorption, circulation, and other still more wonderful and sacred mysteries of these fleshly tabernacles wherein human spirits sojourn on their way to the eternal world. Not rudely and irreverently can those mysteries be explored without injury to the finer susceptibilities and modesties of humanity, least of all by the young. The example of the medical students who alone have hitherto undergone the coarsening influence of such studies, ought to be a warn- ing against flinging wide the doors and inviting eveiy young man, aye, and every young woman, — who seeks a higher education, to come in and partake of such lessons. If parents desire that their sons and their daughters should, in boyhood and in girlhood, be intimately acquainted with all the subjects of which Physiology must treat, and which physiological treatise expound, — if the)' desire them to see the physical, (or, as our forefathers would have called it, the carnal) fact everywhei-e, and the spiritual nowhere, — then they will do well and wisely to promote these great schemes for pressing Physiology into our regular educational system. But if they would dread and hate such a result, they will do well to bestir themselves with all their energies to check the current which is setting strongly, almost irresistably, in that direction. "Kindness to animals is no unworthy exercise of benevolence. The inevitable shortness then of their existence should plead for them touchingly. The insects on the surface of the water, poor ^ ephemeral things, who would needlessly abridge p < p g £ g* £ ^ o 'O. § p n £." O 3 their dancing pleasure of to-day? Such feelings "^^ 3 ^ ? g- £ p 2-3 ^ ^ *« era ^ we should have towards the whole animal crea- S'^C-s „. era ^ o-^o ^S,-o £. ?? tion. We have positive duties to perform to g § ^ § ^ jj ^ S. 2. g o era " HI g those animals over whom we are master for how- ^^ ° n o «* J?" era" S/ ^ p o ^< era ^ ever short a time. This seems too obvious to be n 3 rt^?5 , 3§>oI!a3'i§ 29-i rt .3f»p ** "^ w c/i £> £V though they thought they could buy the right of » ^ § tfj s^ S-^ j< S « 2,3 ill-treating any of God's creatures. We should ' f S2 ) a D.^n§3'§si? '| ? 53 never in any way consent to the ill-treatment of * « j-* o "* nQ^frTspHs;*' 1 '^ animals, because the fear of ridicule, or any other g. g* .g g.3. 5§ o- 3 '"'" o. 5 °* 1 '»' fear, prevents our interfering. As to there being „ ^l^.o.3S-a5'a-uS3«o anything really trifling in any act of humanity, §— 00 ^Pn-"f?3g"'S- c f J „ "> however slight, it is moral blindness to suppose 8 (ti^f^soJ^P^ii-. 2° so. The few moments in the course of each day ** °2. % 3 rt ^STQ'^'m- o * °*y which a man absorbs in some wordly pursuit may s> c^Hc^3o. 0, «>-H^ > 2-gf5 n ' carelessly expend in kind words or trifling char- g " ° n- ^ o 2- 3 3 G. . g 3 j * g ities those around him, and kindness to an ani- £ ^ § S' ? 5 o 3 3: ^ y n 3' 2 " mal is one of these, are perhaps, in the sight of -— -" Heaven, the only time that he has lived to any purpose worthy of recording." [Sir Arthur Helps' Essay on the Exercise of Benevolence.] ffixtimm Bind aito International Sonetg for i\t protection of ^nhnals from fihbettion. Offices: 1, Victokia Stkeet, London, S.W. Vice-Presidents. The Lord Chief Justice of England. His Eminence Cardinal Manning. S.A.R. The Princess Eugenie of Sweden. Prince Lucien Bonaparte. Tite Duchess of Sutherland. The Marquis of Bute. The Marquis of Ailesbury. The Marquis of Hertford. The Marquis of Worcester. The Dowager Marchioness of Ormonde The Earl of Darnley. The Earl of Leven and Melville. The Countess of Portsmouth. Viscount Sidmouth. The Bishop of Winchester. The Bishop of Bath and Wells. The Bishop of Oxford. The Bishop of Liverpool. Lord Cardross. Her Excellency Lauy Paget. Lord Mount-Temple. Lord Tennyson. Lord Justice Lopes. Pit Hon. A. J. Mundella, M.P. Rt. Hon. James Stansfeld, M.P. The Archbishop of Tuam. Hon. Evelyn Ashley. The Dean of Llandaff. General Sir Percy Douglas, Burt, Sir A. Malet, Bart. Sir Gerald Codrixgton, Bart. William Adlam, Esq., F.S.A. Robert T. Reid, Esq., Q.C., M.P. Robert Browning, Esq. Central Executive Committee. Miss Lloyd. Herbert Maksland, Esq. Miss Marston. Rev. .1. Matthews. Mrs. Frank Morrison. The Lauy Mount-Temple. Mrs. James Pender. F. E. Pirkis, Esq., R.N., F.R.G.S. Mrs. Lloyd Price. Miss Ellen E. Rees. The Countess of Seafiei.d. The Rev. John Verschoyle. The Lady Abinger. Mrs. Adlam. Mrs. Arthcr Arnold. The Lady Edith Ashley. Ernest Bell, Esq., M.A. Edward Berdok, Esq., L.R.C.P. Alexr. Bowie, Esq., M.D. Miss Olive Bryant. The Countess of Camperdown. John H. Clarke, Esq., M.D. Miss Frances Power Cobbe. Hon. Stephen Coleridge. W. S. Lilly, Esq. Hon. Treasurer.— Hon. Bernard Coleridge, M.P Secretary— benjamin bryan. 'THE object of this Society is the Total Abolition of the practice of Vivisection 1 as defined in the Report of the Royal Commission. Those who sympathise with this object are entreated to afford the Society all the help in their power, by subscribing, and inducing others to subscribe, liberally to its funds ; by obtaining signatures to Petitions to Parliament ; and also by disseminating the publications of the Society, and especially its organ The Zoophilist, wherein the latest information respecting the Anti-vivisection agitation is to be found. Member's Annual Subscription, 10s. Life Membership, £5. Subscription to The Zoophilist, the Organ of the Cause, 3s. tid. per annum, post free. Pewtress & Co., Printers, 28, Little Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields, W.C. 7.86. HISTORICAL COLLECTION