MICROFILMED 1993 COLL MBTA UNIX ERSITY 11 BR ARIES/NEW YORK as part of the ^ • t> ;^^+'' V. . ,iciT Civilization Preservation Project NATIONAL Funded by the ^ _,„,,, . i. TTrrTTjc MFKT FOR THE HUMANITIES Reproductions may not be made ^jthout Permission from Columbia University Libiary COPYRIGHT STATEMENT The copyright law of the United States - Title 17, United States Code - concerns the making of photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted ^^ate^ Under certain conditions specified in the law, libraries and i_ . _i._i-,-.-^, other s that 'Hf: any archives are authorized to furnish a photocopY reproduction. One of these specified conditions photocopy or other reproduction is not to be - purpose other than private study scholafsnic research." If a user mal/0 : \ W THE VIVISECTION PROBLEM A CONTROVERSY BETWEEN CHARLES S. MYERS, M. D., OF CAMBRIDGE, ENGLAND, AND ALBERT LEFFINGWELL, M. D., OF NEW YORK. PRINTED FOR THE VIVISECTION REFORM SOCIETY 1907. T^HE VIVISECTION REFORM SOCIi: 1 V has been incorporated as the exponent of the principle which demands not the total abolition of a scientific method, but prevention of the aini>e> winch :H:rra:n to ir. WiMiin ccrtri:n limitatiun;. an.* for certain definite (ibjcnts. -: rc,rarn^ sia h experimeii'atinn a- Jc^nanatt; aiia r'g:ht. Carried on beyond these -oan.:s. vivisectic}ii •un-'anc- inonstrous ana crucn a menace to humanity, an aijury to the causc of >(aciicc. This Soc'e^v will continue to oppose the arrocarie^ of human vivisection which it has brought to hght, \vn\\ the hope tliat ti.e some dav h V, v.. ' , '..**-* in'iy ra ■' £%. ■'--¥', and condemned by the entire medical profession. The viviseciiuii oi animals, carried on without legal regulation, sometimes constitutes a forna of scientific torture, which, m the words of the late D: IhaRY J. BiGELOW, of f^arvcira alc'cca; bcia;ol, "is more tenable, bv ns rernien:erit and the efiforts to rroiong it, than burn ai^ at the stake." \'^ e shall a an ^o O »* }' L n A b cits' ■ ' - ■ I ' i)nn except a■^ a 1 u suppre,^ ^uch abuses as are admitted to exist, ami to efiect this w : boat interference with any form or ie>carch conducted under State supervision and guarded no:a"nst abuse, is the object of the Society. dbie \b\asFCi;n)N RffORX! buc!tn' appeal-.. therei'Tc, for encouragement aim -nppnrt lo ai: wfa,> nave at hmirt the honor and interest oi scientific advaiiLCiimni and the prevention ot mjustice and cruelty. The lee for annual mem.bership is $2.00; for life membership, S2 5 oo. Vivisection Reform Society Incorporated in 1903, under the Laws of the United States, PRESIDENT. David H. Cochran, Ph.D., LL.D., Late President of the Polytechnic Institute, Brooklyn, N. Y. SECRETARY. Sydney Richmond Taber, 532 Monadnock Block, Chicago. TREASURER. Alfred Millard, U. S. National Bank, Omaha. DIRECTORS. David H. Cochran, Ph.D., LL.D Brooklyn, N. Y. Hon. James M. Brown, Counsellor at Law Toledo, Ohio. Titus Munson Coan, M. D New York City Charles W. Dulles, M. D Philadelphia Sydney Richmond Taber, Counsellor at Law Chicago VICE-PRESIDENTS. His Eminence, Cardinal Gibbons Baltimore Prof. Goldwin Smith, D.C.L., LL.D Toronto Prof. John Bascom, D.D., LL.D., ex-President of University of Wisconsin Williamstown, Mass. Hon. Jacob H. Gallinger, M.D., U. S. Senator Concord, N. H. Hon. Arba N. Waterman, LL.D., ex-Judge of Illinois Appellate Court Chicago Francis Fisher Browne, Editor of "The Dial" Chicago Edward H. Clement, "Boston Transcript" Boston, Mass. Rt. Rev. Alexander Mackay-Smith, D. D., S.T.D., Bishop Coad- jutor of Pennsylvania Philadelphia Henry M. Field, M.D., late Emeritus Professor of Therapeutics, Dartmouth Medical College, Pasadena, Cal. Charles W. Dulles, M.D., Lecturer on History of Medicine, Uni- versity of Pennsylvania Philadelphia Alfonso David Rockwell, M.D New York City Samuel A. Jones, M.D Ann Arbor, Mich. Rev. Frederick Rowland Marvin, M.D Albany, N. Y. James H. Glass, M.D., Surgeon of Utica City Hospital. .Utica, N. Y. Rev. Francis H. Rowley, D.D., Pastor of First Baptist Church Boston Rev. Leverett W. Spring, D.D., Professor of English Literature in Williams College Williamstown, Mass. i 9 Vivisection Reform Socifty Incorporated in 1908, under the Laws of the United States. f PRESIDENT. David H. Cochran, Ph.D., LL.D., Late President of the Polytechnic Institute, Brookl)^, N. Y. SECRETARY. Sydney Richmond Taber, 532 Monadnock Block, Chicago. TREASURER. Alfred Millard^ U. S. National Bank, Omaha. DIRECTORS. David H. Cochran, Ph.D., LL.D Brooklyn, N. Y. Hon. James M. Brown, Counsellor at Law Toledo, Ohio. Titus Munson Coan, M. D New York City Charles W. Dulles, M. D Philadelphia Sydney Richmond Taber, Counsellor at Law Chicago VICE-PRESIDENTS. His Eminence, Cardinal Gibbons Baltimore Prof. Goldwin Smith, D.C.L., LL.D Toronto Prof. John Bascom, D.D., LL.D., ex-President of University of Wisconsin Williamstown, Mass. Hon. Jacob H. Gallinger, M.D., U. S. Senator Concord, N. H. Hon. Arba N. Waterman, LL.D., ex- Judge of Illinois Appellate Court Chicago Francis Fisher Browne, Editor of "The Dial" Chicago Edward H. Clement, "Boston Transcript" Boston, Mass. Rt. Rev. Alexander Mackay-Smith, D. D., S.T.D., Bishop Coad- jutor of Pennsylvania Philadelphia Henry M. Field, M.D., late Emeritus Professor of Therapeutics, Dartmouth Medical College, Pasadena, CaL Charles W. Dulles, M.D., Lecturer on History of Medicine, Uni- versity of Pennsylvania Philadelphia Alfonso David Rockwell, M.D New York City Samuel A. Jones, M.D Ann Arbor, Mich. Rev. Frederick Rowland Marvin, M.D Albany, N. Y. James H. Glass, M.D., Surgeon of Utica City Hospital. .Utica, N. Y. Rev. Francis H. Rowley, D.D., Pastor of First Baptist Church Boston Rev. Leverett W. Spring, D.D., Professor of English Literature in Williams College Williamstown, Mass. NOTE. i r^e roii<)W!ng papers are reprinted irom the issues of 'he Interna! lONAL Journal of Ethics of April, 1904, January, 190^ and July.. 1QO5. papci pertaining to the controversy, the u i lU state that he did not cniiRiZi: m trif: practice of vivisection," and gave his readers no hmr of the tact tnu he possessed a medical degree. The resu 1 ng oniissiun o! ri;i r-ru^ sn ir-c r p- f-^ ■ \ vcrv natural. A brief [erter rroft: Dr MyERS indicate^ that he posstsses the uSuai medica. qualifications conferrcii m lus nanve country: and he probably represents the attitude of 3 majonty of the medical profession in Europe to-day^-™' an attitude rar Li^crrri: from that of the English people thWty f» »> ■'■ .,_ :"> Is Vivisection Justifiable ? By Charles S. Myers, M. D., Cambbidgx, £ng. I. It might reasonably be supposed that nothing new now rests to be said about a question which has been so often and so hotly discussed in the past as this, and has again and again temporarily become a theme of public interest. A lit- tle consideration, however, must show that the controversy has been confined almost entirely to parties in whom it is impossible not to suspect a certain degree of prejudice, — namely, those who practice vivisection and those who claim to be protectors of animals. It has, moreover, been carried on under the unsatisfactory conditions in which one side denounces the other as an ignorant, sentimental folk, whose enthusiasm for the immediate welfare of the animal world blinds their eyes to truthfulness and to the benefits of vivi- section, while the "protectors of animals," on the other hand, insist that vivisectors have about the same right to be heard upon the justifiability of vivisection as a bird-catcher on the propriety of cooking larks or of wearing osprey feathers. Vivisection is to their mind merely a passing fashion, for which unmerited academic position and the mistaken sanc- tion of those occupied in scientific research form the attrac- tive recompense. It is clear, then, that the subject can be treated with the necessary impartiality only by one who, while sympathetic towards dumb creatures and having ade- quate knowledge of modern biological science, does not en- gage in the practice of vivisection; who, if he desire ade- quate competency, should have some general acquaintance with the principles of ethics and have had a training in psy- chology that will help him to gauge the probable extent and intensity of animal suffering. Two distinct questions have to be answered. Is vivisec- tion moral? Is vivisection useful? The former question clearly deserves consideration before the latter, for, if once vivisection be proved immoral, its utility can hardly remain ■■J li ? concern. II. Of those opposed to vivisection on the ground of its im- morality, there is a small section whose views may be con- veniently stated at once, as thev can then be dismissed with little further consideration. These people consider that the animials of this world are specially placed under man's pro- tection bv the Divine Will., Thev regard it as sinful and as an abuse of our superior unelligence for man to give pain to animals for anv ourtKjse whatever. Thev would, if possible, refuse to avail themselves i-tent: did they, for exampie., refuse to slaughter cattle or to poison vermin for the sake of mcrea:^- ing the r creature comforts, one could not but respect their >-) f f « *- 1 1 ■ -, This, whicii ma \ for brevity's sake, be styled the relig- ious" view . 1- the extreme form of another, more generally held and regarded, perhaps, as the ''common sense" view. It permits the infliction of a certain amount of pain upon^ animals, provmed that the gain to man is sufficient! \- great. Tt countenances the operation of castration, so crudely per- formed on millions of animals annually, on the ground that man obtains thereby better beasts of burden and finer qual- ity of flesh and wool. It justifies the mtroduction or horses into the battleneld, because cavalry are indispensable in war- fare. A salmon may be "played," a fox or stag may be hunted, because sport is man's instinctive recreation and be- cause the skill or the social pleasures involved are suthcuuitly . great. But vivisection is intolerable, as its results are in- commensurably small compared with the suflFering produced. Such, no doubt, is the attitude of the majority of anti-vivi- sectionists,— an attitude which only a careful estimate of the resulting pains and gains of vivisection can confirm or condemn. These two views, the 'Veligious" and the "common-sense," as they have here been styled, are alike obtained from the "zoocentric" standpoint: that is, where vivisection aooears unmoral Dccaiise . j I -, , the suriermg wmch must mevitably be another and w t t f-| (-if .a < Q mhuu.ed on the totally diflferent point of view f : uiv h tfie subject may be regarded, the "anthropocentric" btanup mt, which con- demns vivisection, not so much on account of the pain en- dured b} the aninialv, as on the ground of the cruelty in- volved ; that is, the effect produced by animal suffering upon man. This third view may, perhaps, best be designated "naturalistic." The question here arises. Who, in the absence of scrip- tural authority (rejected by naturalism), has a right to con- demn as immoral a practice which is confined to a small but intelligent section of a community? It is well recognized that nearly every walk of life sanctions certain acts which in the other walks would be deemed immoral. Different communities, different sections of communities, frame their own systems of morality. The ethical codes of the com- pany-promoter the farm-hand or the slum-dweller differ both from one another and from that of the general popu- lation, just as, on a larger scale, the morality of the savage is different from that of the European. May not vivisection in this way be regarded as a moral act by physiologists and pathologists and as an immoral act by other people? In this event, have the latter the right to interfere with the practice? Most certainly they have. For, even if vivisec- tion has not a deteriorating effect on the natures of those engaged in it, even if it does not render them callous and insensitive to the sufferings of others (a protasis which will be examined immediately), yet the general community may legitimately intervene on the ground that it is harmful for them to feel that such suffering is being inflicted in their midst. At his examination before the Royal Commission on Vivi- section in 1875, Dr. Klein was asked (Q. 3539), "When you say that you only use them [anaesthetics] for convenience' sake, do you mean that you have no regard nt all for the sufferi!]g> of trie animals?" And his reply, "No regard ai all" lias been widely hcki to prove the utter lieartles^iiess of ila-e who experiment on Hvmg ariiniab. Vet not only IS Dr. Klein [jerfectly right, but— as everv^one who kneov^ tneui eaii te-tir\- — vivi sector- are n air,- other body of nuui less kind and Hit I t t ' ft fact that i i } » a t r ; 5 1 1 1 s i I v. 1.1 1 1 L i I 1 1' ; )ne hve^ a life of multiple per^onahta:s. in the ] iie man of business is one person at his office: he is another in the heart of his faniilv. The thoughts or die ij^jtanist, whan dis^eeong flower-, arc not those he ha- wlien adnnrniir a beautiful hmdscape. d"he surgeon and the vivi-i-ctur tnaore the operating table have to banish all regard for trie victim of their knife. Sympathy would be not only u>tless, bat positively dairmiental to the ^ncces- of their work. All attent n has to be concentrated on the operation which ma- tura consideration has previously dictated. Indeed, there i> no ground for suspecting that vivisection has a baneful elfect on the temperament of those that prac- tice it. The question remains, then, Has the public a right to intervene on account of the cruel acts which, it feels, are being perpetrated? And thus the luruum question arises, How much pain does vivisection produce ? It is well under- stood that two kinds of experience of very different origin are included under the word "pain." In oric aen:De, pain is opposed to plea^url: and has reference to the general tone of consciousness, called feeling. Thus, we are pleased at success, pained at bereavement; an animal is pleased at the sight of food, pa lad a an chased by the fa In the other sense, pain is the re>ult of appropriate stimulation of almost any sensory nerve n the body. Common parlance distin- guishes these two kinds of pain as "mental" and "physical." Now, there is little evidence of mental pain in the subjects of vivisection. Again and again dogs have l)een observed to wag the tail or lick the hands of the operator, even im- mediately before the beginning of the experiment. Shortly after the severest operation an animal is generally ready to eat its food. With regard to physical pain, it is desirable to consider somewhat fully the object of vivisection experi- ments, before an estimate of the amount involved can be arrived at. Vivisection is employed to throw light either on healthy (physiological) or on morbid (pathological) processes. The prime aim of physiological experiment, broadly speaking, is ond neons attam- of study. It is to place the animal tinder the most nauwa' able. .Pain it-elf !< hardly ever da: -i;a: detrimental to the purposes of physiological experiment and is studiously avoided. Every effort is made to diminish it, even In tla se cases where organs or parts of organs are re- moved fr !u the body in order to test their function by a process of elimination; in such operations an anaesthetic is always administered. "In no case has a cutting operation more severe than a superficial venisection been allowed to be performed without anaesthetics" * during recent years in this country. Surgery is strictly aseptic. Should sepsis set in, the law requires that the animal be killed. Pain is ob- viously detrimental to physiological experiment because of the accompanying disturbances in muscular action by which we commonly recognize it. Changes in the calibre of the blood vessels, changes in 'the force and frequency both of the heart-beat and of the respirations, cries and bodily move- ments, — these are the signs of pain. Clearly, all, in various degrees, impair the success of physiological research, and are to be avoided. But, while they are all concomitants of pain, it must never be forgotten that they are by no means sure evidence of pain. Cries and muscular movements, ap- parently indicative of pain, may occur during operation on man, when the subject is perfectly under the influence of an anaesthetic. They may be evoked from an animal when its cerebral hemispheres are no longer connected with the rest of the nervous system. Nor are these concomitants a sure * Reports of the inspector of experiments performed on living animals (Acts 39 and 40, Vic. C. 77), 1901, 1902. A similar sentence occurs in Reports 1899 and 1900. measure of pain. Man is only too prone to suppose that the behaviour that he observes in others implies the presence of the same state of feelings in them as would induce the same behaviour in himself. When an animal manifests the appro- pruite sigiib, tilt: sentimentalist at once leaps to tlic coriciu- sion that it must suffer }n>t tiie feelings of distress which would be hi- under similar conditions. Errors of this kind arc so u ell known to students of mental phenomena that they iiave been termed "the psychologist's fallacyd' Now, there is abundant evidence to show that, even in man, wide differ- ences in sensibility to pain exist, varving according to race and civilization. The natives of the Torres Straits, for in- stance, who have been expressly examined in this respect, proved to be about half as sensitive to pain as Englishmen.* How much more obtuse, then, must be the suffering of ani- mals, who diiTer in mental build from man immeasurably more than the races of men differ from one another! Moreover, those areas of the body, stimulation of which can produce painful sensations, are far less numerous than might be supposed. It is true that, when inflamed, almost a-njr part may become painful. But, under non-inflammatory conditions, most, if not all, the internal organs may be han- dled painlessly. Thus, Sir Charles Bell wrote of the human brain, 'T have had my finger deep in the anterior lobes of the brain, when the patient, being at the time acutely sensible and capable of expressing himself, complained only of the integument."' The recent experiments of Professor Len- nander on man have confirmed the view^ that the human viscera and their supporting peritoneum are wholly insensi- tive to pain. Bichat long ago wrote that he had seen dogs tearing their peritoneum and devouring their own intestines, which had protruded from a liule in the abdominal wall. Considerations of this kind only ^how what control the lay- man should exercise over the -oring-s of his natural i)itv. when he reads of seeminglv painful, but reallv painless, ex- * [jenments upon the intern. O' living; animals ^ ^ Reports of the Cambridge Anthropolofica! Expedition to the Torres Straits. Cambridge, 1903. Vol. 2, p. 193. •Quoted in "Experiments ou Animals," by Stephen Paget. London, 1903. P, 75, footnote. physiologists of this country compulsorily, of others volun- tarily, put under the influence of an anaesthetic during such operations. It is not to be denied that some pain must ensue during physiological experiments, and it may be urged with reason that the amount of pain must be considerably greater when vivisection is performed for pathological ends. This ob- jection gains apparent support from the fact that the greater number of vivisections performed by pathologists in this rt 1 1 iricate A. whicii countr\ reqinre a license, kiit. [)ennits experimeiu without an anresthetic,, it ha-, iiowcver, been alreadv explamed tliat no cnHTation more ^evf^r.^ ^h-in tlie section of a superficial vein is allowed to take place with this certificate. Of the 12.776 vi\-jsections performed with Certificate A last vear. 7,854 were nierelv moculations. the chief objects of which were to diagnose various diseases in animals and man ( no less than 153 referred to the detection of rabies), to exarnme milk for the bacillns of tuberculosis, hair for the bacillus of anthrax, to test the safetv of at^nos- pheric air and sewage, to standardize antitoxin- fc.r the purpose of protecting animals and man from disease A large proportion of such experiments must have been ahsn- lutely negative. The air or the milk, for example, must have been often health\\ and the nioculated animal suffered no more pain than was involved in the needle-prick. More- over, the law of the countrv compels the vivisector tn kill the animal when the object of the experiment is com|dcted, if. as is sometnner^ inevitable, pani en-ue- fmri inoculation. Lven when it dues of a flrug or a U)xin. tfie pain of such a well-fed animal cannot exceed that 01 a poi-oned, uncared- for rat or house-niuu-w In fine, not only is the pain of vivisection reduced to its r\ '% % ' *i c f iOW uM -J f 1 1 1 1 ' not only do the interests of the experimenter J ' tht \u\v compel him to take good care of the animal, but the sev( r tv of animal suffering is far less than the lay mind would naturall} suppose, and there is no reason to believe that vivisection renders the operator indifferent to the feel- ings of others. III. It is, fortunately, needless to examine tHe second part of the problem, namely the utility of vivisection, at such length as the first. The necessary material has been ably and im- partially published by Stephen Paget in his ''Experiments on Animals," and may be directly consulted by those who wish to investis^ate the subject without prejudice. Foremost among the rc>iiu,> ui modern vivisection stan-i- ni^ and)w, certain essen- uaJN have to be rigadh- lulnlled, l)efore aiu' nncru-organisni can lie detiniteh' pr(.)\a:d \u ])e a factor ni the |)ruduction of a ^ii^ea^e. Idle bacillu- nni-t he con^tantU j^resent in ah ca>es ; it must l,)e i><.)la!ed anolute proof e>tablished of the dependence of disease upon the micri)- or^anism, hut autitoxin> — cenani ciienucal substance^ \vh]-,' arc ciabora Ui Lne bloOu i)t ainua i])riatehv- moculaiesl ani- nuii> by nature ir»v the purpose of resisting the di^ea>e — iiave been i>olated lor use, U) the cu.a-mous benefit of ani- maL and niankuid. As Stephen Paget pouu^ out i op. eit. p. 2^0^, ''In Cape Colony alone, so far !)ack a- i^nn, alnujrU half a miui ;!i cattle had received preventive treatment against rinderpest." Tuberculosis in cattle has been like- wise checked by the use of tuberculin. The severity and fatality of typhoid fever, and especially of diphtheria, have been unquestionably reduced by the use of the appropriate antitoxin. Similar success has attended the antitoxin treat- ment of Mediterranean fever, which for so long defied every known drug. Hardly a failure is on record from the treat- ment of snake-bite. The value of vaccination in small-pox is universally recognized by those competent to judge. And even where bacteriological research has yielded no cure, its influence has been scarcely less striking. The remedy for tuberculosis has still to be found, but untold good has al- io ready resulted from the discovery that a bacillus lies at the root of the disease. Precautions are now taken (rightly or wrongly, it remains to be seen) against tuberculous meat and milk, a more sanguine view of consumption of the lungs is entertained, the sputa are disinfected and the patients are isolated at any early stage of the disease. Contrast this condition of affairs with the present attitude towards cancer, of the causes of which we are totally ignorant, or towards diabetes of wiricli \ ivisection has so far taught us something, but not everything of the 3etiolo8^>^ Experiments on living animals are at this rncMuent h'vuig j)erf' uaned, to preserve animals and men from tlu^se riread diseases. Wdio, in the name of reason and humanity, would forbid iiiem? Heroes ha\ e not been wanting who have offered their own persons for expermicni U) advance pathological knruvledge. In the re^earche< upon \-ellow fever. >e\'cral m(h\-idu:ds were inoculated. The transmissibilit) of bovine 1 \ui< liCcn -nnilarlv tested. A martvr 11,. Tcuiosi> to y- experimental tubi met his death, demonstraimg die crnuagiou-ness of Peruvian Sore. Two Englishmen, to prove the connection of the mosquito with malaria, submitted their bodies to be bitten by mosquitoes which had been sent here from Italy after having been fed upon the blood of malarious patients. If legislation can stay experiments on living animals, it is powerless to prevent voluntary experiment of man on him- self. The first use of a new drug, the first performance of a new operation, are not these experiments of man on man ? Should the invaluable anti-plague bouillon have been tested on men, instead of on rabbits, before its introduction as a national remedy ? Or should men, instead of monkeys, have been experimentally fly-bitten, in order to obtain proof that the tsetse-fly transmits to men the micro-organism of sleep- ing sickness; the Anopheles mosquito, the micro-organism of malaria; the Culex mosquito, that of yellow fever and of elephantiasis ? Havana is practically rid of yellow fever for the first time in history, and malaria is fast disappearing in similar fashion from its haunts, wherever stagnant pools are properly treated so as to make them serve no longer as the breeding places of mosquitoes. II It is almost needless to give further examples of the value of vivisection experiments. The experimental determination of the functions of various parts of the cerebral hemispheres, especially in the monkey, has led to successful operations in certain forms of epilepsy and cerebral tumor where the affected area can be accurately localized, inspected and re moved. The discoverv of the meaning ni the ^cmn6> of tlie heart wa^ aided b}' the iiioditication of one or other sound m arnmaL by experimental means, \dvisection has coinpietei\- ehanged our vitws of the radation of the internal organs of the bod\' to the general econunne IroJeed, as Charle- Darwm declared, "I eannot thmk of an'.' one -ten which ha- been made in physiology withont thr i raid* It has been said that these various ad\ ances might have been nanie oothoat the aid of vivi"=ection, but history shows plainly enough rio\v m the absence of extaaament men cling to authority rather than admit the discovery of new facts. In his address at the last year's Medical Congress at Cairo, Professor Bouchard declared that "the empiricism of older days has given us nearly all our drugs, among which are several which cure, ... the use of which we have learnt b) happy accident/' * Fortunately, "happy accident" and mediaevalisni no longer content us: the modern spirit require- accurate and systematic investigation. It is true that quinine was known to cure malaria long before the Plasmodium malariae was found, but the discovery of the plasmoduim and our knowledge of its life-history have en- abled us to administer the drug for men rationally and effi- ciently. A favorite quotation in anti-vivisectionist literature is culled from the works of the great English vivisector. Sir Charles Bell : "Experiments have never been the means of discovery/' This sentiment is broadly true in one sense. Experiments are rarely performed with a view to discovery, and rarely lead to it by accident. No scientific investigator would say, "Let us make this experiment and see what we can discover." He frames a theory on the basis of the facts already known to him, and he proceeds to confirm or to re- * Lancet, Feb. 7, 1903. 12 ject this theory by an appeal to experiment. It is in this way that knowledge advances. Without experiment it must stagnate. Apart from all question of its morality and utility, vivi- section leads directly to increased wisdom. Apart from the fact that the useless disconnected knowledge of to-day be- comes the useful co-ordinated knowledge of the morrow, any rational mode of research which yields new results is im- perishable. With all its power. Legislation can never quench the thirst after Truth, or extinguish the race of Martyrs. As long as retrograde and progressive sections co-exist in the same community, so long will the efforts of the reactionary always be felt within it. There will be al- ways some to maintain the geocentric theory of the universe or the seven-day theory of creation, however clear the evi- dence to the contrary ; always some to believe that the Fall of Man comes from the Fruit of Knowledge. These are the real opponents of Vivisection. 13 The Vivisection Problem A Reply. By Albert Leffingwell, M. D. New Yo«k. The thoughtful article on vivisection which appeared in the April number of this periodical is suggestive of con- clusions with which some of its readers are not inclined to agree. By a process oi reasoning, based, we think, upon an imperfect acquaintance with the facts, the writer has appar- ently come to believe that animal experimentation is so care- fully and humanely carried on, so free from all abuse and so productive of benefit to humanity that it should be permitted to continue, untouched by the criticism of the ''sentimental- ist" and unhindered by restriction or restraint. What de- fects are to be found in Mr. Myers' line of reasoning? Why do arguments, such as those which he has so ably pre- sented, fail to convince some whose regard for the progress of science is as genuine as his own? Against the sugges- tion or claim that vivisection is, in effect, altogether right, how is it that some intelligent men believe that certain phases of the practice are unjustifiable and wrong? Within the limits of a brief paper, it is, of course, impossible to bring forward all the reasons for dissent ; but some outline may be given, sufficient to define the differing standpoint of those who believe that without definite limitations, the practice of vivisection is sometimes carried to an extent which is not ethically just. Is vivisection ever painful ? Does it sometimes imply pro- longed agony? This seems to us a matter of no little im- portance. We think that the decision regarding the morality of the practice rests almost entirely upon the answer to this one question. Could it be demonstrated beyond doubt that a dog undergoing vivisection suffers no more of what we call pain, than a tuft of grass torn out by its roots, or a flower pulled to pieces, the justifiability of animal vivisection 14 i i would be assured. The impeachment of unlimited vivisec- tion rests wholly upon the conviction that in some of its phases it is productive of agony. A few years ago hardly anybody in the medical profession questioned the fact. To- day, nearly every apologist for the method, attempts, as Mr. Myers has done, to show the absence of any great degree of discomfort. Every effort, he assures us, is made to dimin- ish pain ; "an anaesthetic is always administered" ; the pain of certain inoculations is but that of a needle-prick; and even the cries and contortions of a vivisected creature are to be regarded for the most part, as an illusion. "When an animal manifests the appropriate signs, the sentimentalist at once leaps to the conclusion that the behavior that he ob- served in others implies the presence of the same state of feelings in them as would induce the same behavior in him- self." But this, Mr. Myers assures us, is an error of the kind known as the "psychologist's fallacy" ; we really know nothing about it. "Considerations of this kind only show what control the layman should exercise over the springs of his natural pity, when he reads of seemingly painful, but really painless experiments upon the internal organs of liv- ing animals." That during such operations (which, by the way, are sometimes extended over weeks and months) the animals are put under the influence of an anaesthetic ; that in England this is demanded by law, that in other countries it is the voluntary custom of physiologists — all this he most confidently and fervently seems to believe. It is not denied that occasionally some pain may ensue; but to this writer, this apparently seems of such a trifling character that he passes it without criticism. That the pain inflicted in vivi- section ever amounts to torture, is not once admitted or implied. Now we are far from being satisfied with the comfortable conclusions which Mr. Myers has apparently reached, and which he desires to impress upon his readers. He tells us at the outset that he is not a practical vivisector ; and his state- ments regarding the practice must therefore rest upon the exculpatory assertions of the very persons against whom the charge of inhumanity has been made. Do all of these 15 persons invariably tell us the whole truth about a practice whereby they earn their daily bread ? Is it in accord with what Mr. Gladstone happily designated *'the delicate sense of the reasonableness of things" that some of the men charged with cni i- should not attempt to defend them- selves by distorting the truth? It seems to us that, while the statement^ of experimenters are entitled to all considera- tion which ;h inuter and motl^c^ imply, a little hesitancv in grantinij absolute faith mav be excusable; and that 'lavnicn an- senti-nentali^t,^'' have >orne reaMjn to doubt. That vivi- sected animals soinetimes sutter. i> a charge that rests wholly iipnri the evidence of men who are neither ^'sentimentalists" iV'T 'davmen." but members of the medical profession. Speakmg before the British Medical Association at its an- nual meeting in 1899, the President of one of the sections, Dr. George Wilson, LL. D., made this remarkable charge : "I boldly say there should be some pause in these ruthless lines of experimentation. ... I have not allied mvself to the anti-vivisec- tionists, hut / accuse my profession of misleading the public as to the cruelUes and horrors which are perpetrated on animal life When It is stated that the actual pain involved in these experiments is^ commonly of the most trifling description, there is a suppression ot the truth, of the most palpable kind. ... The cruelty does not he in the operation itself, which is permitted to be performed with- out an^ethetics, but in the after effects. Whether so-called toxins are injected under the skin into the peritoneum, into the cranium under the dura mater, into the pleural cavity, into the veins, eyes] or other organs— and all these methods are ruthlessly practised- there ts long-drawn-out agony. The animal so innocently operated on may have to live days, weeks, or months, with no anaesthetic t0 assauge its sufferings, and nothing hut death to relieve" fltalirs ours.] ■ *■ And yet Mr. Myers would have us believe that even in these experiments the pain "cannot exceed that of a poisoned rat or mouse." How does he know ? Do poisoned rats and mice live in agony ''for days, weeks, or months" ? Take another medical witness. In his presidential ad- dress before the American Academy of Medicine, Dr. The- ophilus Parvin, LL. D., a professor of Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, protested warmly against the cruelty of certain vivisectors. There were men, he declared, botk in America and Europe, "who seem, seeking useless knowl- edge, to be blind to the writhing agony, and deaf to the cry 16 of pain of their victims, and who have been guilty of the most damnable cruelties, without the denunciation by the public and the profession that their wickedness deserves." Is not this remarkable language, coming— not from a "lay- nian," — but a professor in a leading medical college, regard- ing a practice wherein Mr. Myers finds nothing worthy of criticism? It was no sentimentalist, but rather one of the most distinguished surgeons that America ever produced, an i lor inanv vear^ a professor in Harvard Medical School — Dr. H< iirv J. Bigelow. LL. D , who in a paper read before the Massachusetts ^ledical Society, protested against ''the cold-blooded cruelties now m.ore and more practiced under thv authoritv of science.'^ producing results which he de- clared were "contemptible, compared with the price paid in agonv and torture." Elsewhere the same eminent medical authority says: 'The ground for public supervision is that vivisection immeasur- ably beyond any other pursuit, involves the infliction of torture to little or no purpose. Motive apart, painful vivisection differs from that usual cruelty of which the law takes absolute cognisance, main- ly in being practised by an educated class, who, having once become callous to its objectionable features, find its pursuit an interesting occupation under the name of Science, . . . ''The law should interfere. There can be no doubt that in this relation there exists a case of cruelty to animals far transcending in its refinement and in its horror anything that has been known in the history of nations. "There will come a time when the world will look back to modern vivisection in the name of Science as it now does to burning at the stake in the name of religion." [Italics ours.] Quotations like these, from the writings of medical men might be indefinitely multiplied. They are the utterances not merely of physicians, but of medical professors familiar with what goes on about them. We cannot afford to dis- miss them with a shrug and a sneer. If their tones seem more resonant than those of the majority in their profession, it may be because success and assured eminence have gained for them the inestimable privilege of absolute fearlessness regarding the criticism of lesser men. But of the existence of these ''cold-blooded cruelties," of this agony and torture, of this pain to which death by burning alive is a happy release — where do we find the slightest reference in Mr. 17 Myers' paper? Not a hint of its existence is there to be found ! Why ? Is it because he accepts with implicit faith the word of the experimenter? That is his privilege. We admit that it may be a matter of choice. But upon whom is reliance most safely placed in our attempts to penetrate to the truth,— upon men grown old in the medical profession, connected with institutions of learning, men who cannot have the slightest reason for adverse criticism, but every inducement for discreet silence— or, on the other hand, the practical experimenter who may feel that his position is dependent upon the maintenance of absolute freedom to do whatever he likes within the walls of his laboratory? If space permitted, it would be of interest to follow all the ramifications of Mr. Myers' remarkable argument. In certain directions, it seems to us to .denote a peculiar ten- dency to credulity wherever vivisection is in question. Bichat, he tells us naively, once saw dogs "tearing their peritoneum and devouring their own intestines which had protruded from a hole in the abdominal wall." But does Mr. Myers seriously consider such an action as the painless and contented gratification of the animal's appetite ? Once, in a physiological laboratory, we witnessed precisely the same thing ; an animal, during a vivisection, partly escaped from its bonds, and with the utmost fury of despair, bit and tore its own bleeding wounds. Had Mr. Myers been pres- ent at that experiment, we- hardly believe he would have contended for its painlessness. "Again and again," he as- sures us, "dogs have been observed to wag the tail or lick the hands of the operator, even immediately before the be- ginning of the operation !" What inference would he have us draw from the fact ? That it betokens the happiness of the animal? Observers have drawn a far diflFerent conclu- sion. "I recall to mind," said Dr. Latour, "a poor dog, the root of whose spinal nerves Magendie was about to expose. Twice did the dog, all bloody and mutilated, escape from the implacable knife, and twice did I see him put his fore- paws around Magendie's neck and lick his face ! I confess I could not bear the sight." It was a phenomenon recorded also by the editor of the London Lancet in a description of i8 I what once was done in the physiological laboratory. "Look," says this editor of the leading medical journal of England, "at the animal before us, stolen (to begin with) from his master; the poor creature, hungry, tied up for days and nights, pining for his home, is at length brought into the theater. As his crouching and feeble form is strapped upon the table, he licks the very hand that ties him! He struggles, but in vain, and uselessly expresses his fear and suflfering. . " We need not go on with this picture of past ex- perimentation. It is merely of interest to show how the same fact impresses different men. Strange it is, that a dog, licking the hand of "the operator immediately before the beginning of the operation" should seem to any man to betoken the absence of all apprehension — a sign of happy animal indifference to its fate, rather than the mute, in- stinctive and vain appeal for sympathy to a being in the human form. But the most painful part of Mr. Myers' essay, and in one sense its most significant inference, pertains to his unquali- fied approval of the attitude taken by Dr. Emanuel Klein. When this distinguished vivisector was examined before the Royal Commission regarding his practices and opinions, he frankly and honestly admitted that he never used chloro- form or any other anaesthetic, except in public demonstra- tions, unless necessary for his personal convenience ; de- clared that a physiologist had the right to "do as he likes with the animal"; that to save himself irtconvenience he would perform even one of the most painful of operations on a dog's nerves without the use of anaesthetics ; that he held himself ''entirely indifferent to the sufferings of the animal," and had "no regard at all" to the anguish of the creatures experimented upon. Quoting the last sentence, Mr. Myers does not hesitate to declare that "Dr. Klein is perfectly right" We are not particularly surprised at this assurance of his agreement ; but unless very much mistaken, Mr. Myers is the first Englishman who, during the past quarter of a century, has openly confessed his sympathy with such sentiments. Certainly, they were very far from meeting the approval of scientific men at the time they were 19 uttered. One of the most eminent scientists of the last century, writing to another man of equal eminence, thus re- ferred to this profession of indifference to animal suffering : "This Commission is playing the deuce with me. I have felt it my duty to act as counsel for Science, and was well satisfied with the way thmgs are going. But on Thursday, when I was absent, — — was exammed; and if what I hear is a correct account of the evidence he gave, I may as well throw up my brief. I am told he openly confessed the most entire indifference to animal suffering and he only gave anaesthetics to keep the animal quiet ! "I declare to you, I did not believe the man lived, who was such an unmitigated, cynical brute as to profess and act upon such prin- ciples; and I would willingly agree to any law that would send him to the treadmill." We must ask pardon for the quotation of these forcible and far-reaching denunciations. They occur in a letter writ- ten to Charles Darwin by Professor Huxley. More than a quarter of a century has elapsed since the great English biologist thus made known the feeling which such senti- ments inspired. The times have changed. To-day, a writer in defense of this attitude of indifference, tells us that Dr. Klein "is perfectly right." The utility of animal experimentation is a question too great to be discussed now. The trouble with most of the advocates for vivisection without limitations is that they go far out of the way to glean and gather what they hope may be fresh evidences of its utility. Even those who regard vivisection in its milder aspects with a favorable eye will hardly care very much for the evidences of its usefulness that Mr. Myers presents us. Hardly a single claim made rests upon generally acknowledged facts. What, for exam- ple, has "the value of vaccination in small-pox"— however "widely recognized"— to do with vivisection of animals? Mr. Myers brings it into his catalogue of utilities, seemingly unconscious that with Jenner's discovery the practice of vivisection had nothing to do. Where are the proofs that the mortality from typhoid fever in any country has been reduced by the general use of the "appropriate antitoxin" ? Where are we to look for similar evidence regarding mor- tality from "the Mediterranean fever" in France and Italy ? We venture to say that official statistics proving any marked 20 reduction in the mortality from these causes of death through use of such antitoxin cannot be produced. It is in- teresting to know that for the first time in its history, "Ha- vana is practically rid of yellow fever." What has this to do with experiments on animals ? Perhaps the most surpris- ing assertion of utility is that which concerns the mortality resulting from the venom of serpents; we are told that "hardly a failure is on record from the treatment of snake- bite." Of course a statement like this may mean anything — or nothing at all. Of any number of imaginable drugs or appliances it might very truthfully be said that there is "no record of failure," — simply because they have not been tried. But if Mr. Myers believes, and desires to convey the im- pression that a specific and almost certain cure for the poison of venomous serpents has at last been discovered through experimentation upon animals, and that its claims of efficacy are amply evinced by a decrease in the mortality from this cause in the countries where venomous serpents abound, he is entirely mistaken. Every year, in British India alone, over twenty thousand men, women and children lose their lives from this one cause. That was the record up to five years ago. Has this mortality been diminished in any ap- preciable degree by the employment of the new remedy re- garding whose use we are assured that there is "hardly a failure on record?" If so, where are the statistics? There are none. It is a claim of the laboratory. No such specific, the value of which has been demonstrated by a steady de- crease of mortality as shown in the statistics of any country, can be said to exist. This is not criticism of this phase of experimentation. It is not denial that certain laboratory ex- periments have been apparently successful. But the claim should have stopped there. We cannot but think that the suggestion of a far wider utility should never have been made in view of the present practical impotency of every al- leged discovery of the kind. What may we say of the moral aspect of unlimited vivi- section? Every man's attitude toward this question will depend in great measure upon certain primary intellectual concepts. Behind a thinking man's judgment of what is 21 right or wrong in human conduct must be his personal con- viction regarding the meaning of the Universe in which he dwells. The creed of the vivisector is not always beautiful Writmg for the Popular Science Monthly a few years since a leading American biologist, Professor Hodge of Clark University, declared that "God clearly gives to man every sanction to cause any amount of physical pain which he may find expedient to unravel His laws/' Seldom, if ever has the supremacy of science over the ordinary conceptions of morality been more definitely announced. If this doc- trine be true, then the experiments with poisons, made by Rmger and others upon patients in a London hospital, the experiments upon dying children and the incurably insane, made in certain American institutions— would all find equal justification with every phase of animal experimentation ; for it could then be said that "they were expedient to unravel His laws." And if the elucidation of a new fact makes right any method by which it may be torn from the secrecy wherein Nature has concealed it,— if this be the meaning of the message which modern Science is to proclaim to Hu- manity, then, in more senses than one, we are at the begin- ning of a new era. One may, indeed, imagine a Universe wherein the idea of Justice does not exist, where compassion and pity and sympathy are unknown, and where Might makes Right. In such a world, no thought of the upright- ness of an action would come to mind. In such a world —unchecked except by fear— would flourish whatever tyr- anny might desire and force compel, the prostitution " of woman, the slavery of the weak, the murder of the helpless, the causation of any amount of physical pain upon animals or children, if thereby what is hidden by Nature could be brought to light. It would be the reign of selfishness and greed, of lust and force, of cruelty— and utility. That to- day, we are not living in a world, ruled supremely by claw and tooth and nail ; that some conception of moral ideas has brightened the path of humanity in its slow progress upward from brutality ; that with us, power does not mean equity ; that cruelty is infamous, and injustice is ignoble, and pity is divine, this world of ours owes to teaching far different 22 from that of the biologist who, in his imagination, creates a "God" that hides facts, and gives torture the right to find them. What may we hope to accomplish in the reform of vivi- section as it exists to-day? Considerations of space forbid anything but the briefest of outlines; and yet certain lines of possible activity would seem apparent. It seems to us, that first of all, there must be the gradual creation of public sentiment which shall be eager, not so much to condemn all vivisection, or to approve it all, as to know with certainty the facts. Take, for example, the question of vivisection in institutions of learning. To what extent is it carried on merely to demonstrate what every student knows in ad- vance? If one may judge from authoritative statements put forth for general information, it would appear that cer- tain lines of experiment are now permitted in America and in England, which hardly more than a generation ago were condemned as cruel by the medical profession of Great Britain. We ought to know if this is true ; and if found so, we ought to inquire why it is that experiments which scarcely thirty years ago were almost universally condemned, are less abhorrent to-day ? The removal of the secrecy that so generally enshrouds vivisection is the first and most im- portant step toward any true reform. And when secrecy is removed, and we know the facts, then must there be a yet wider promulgation of the truth about it than is possible to-day. By the propaganda of the press, by the advocacy of the principles which underlie our opposition to irresponsible and unrestricted vivisection, by the contrast of views, by the incitement of interest in a sub- ject which is naturally most distasteful to the average mind, there must gradually be created a public sentiment that will be heard when it asks for some measure of reform, for some method for preventing what ought not to exist. And finally, there must come the regulation of vivisection by law. This does not mean the abolition of all physiolog- ical investigation, as they who clamor for non-interference so often assert. It need not imply a single impediment to any scientific inquiry that is of potential value to humanity 23 and possible without anguish. But the law certainly should forbid all cruel and all useless experiments such as those so emphatically condemned by Parvin and Bigelow and Wilson. It ought to bring upon official records the number of experi- ments performed, the objects which were in view, the results which were attained, the species of animals upon which the investieation^ uere made, the anaesthetics which were ad- mmistered, and everything that pertains to the prevention of pain. We may say that all this is but little more than the drawing aside of curtains and the admission of the light. It is so little to ask that one is amazed at the resistance which the laboratory makes to the demand. Will that re- sistance be perpetually effective ? We doubt it. No human institution has yet been able to keep hidden what the world wishes to know ; and when all is known we may be sure that in the matter of vivisection the distinction will be very clearly drawn between what is permissible and what is to be con- demned by the conscience of mankind. 24 THE VIVISECTION PROBLEM : A REJOINDER. By C. S. Myers, M. D. I have neither the desire nor the time to reply at length to Dr. Leffingweirs criticism to my paper. Dr. Leffingwell asks, "What ... has the value of vac- cination in small-pox . . . to do with the vivisection of an- imals?" Is he unaware that the supply of lymph for the purpose of vaccination in civilized communities is derived from calves who are expressly inoculated for the purpose? He asks, "Where are the proofs that the mortality from typhoid fever in any country has been reduced by the gen- eral use of the 'appropriate antitoxin' ?" He will find them in Dr. G. E. Wright's data derived from the Boer War, which are gaining general acceptance. Then he inquires, "What has this [the fact that Havana is practically rid of yellow fever] to do with experiments on animals?" I will tell him. Yellow fever has been van- quished by the destruction of mosquitoes; the relation of mosquitoes to yellow fever was suggested by their already proven relation to malaria ; our knowledge of the life-history of the malarial parasite was in great measure due to ex- periments on birds. He suggests that the reason why there is no record of failure in the use of antivenene as a remedy against snake- bite is that this remedy has never been tried. I refer him to the list of cases of snake-bite successfully treated by anti- venene, in the "Twentieth Century Practice of Medicine," Vol. XX, pp. 527-528. Surely then. Dr. Leffingwell is very right when he says, "It seems to us that first of all there must be the general creation of public sentiment which shall be eager , , , to know with certainty the facts/' He accuses English physicians of experimenting with poi- sons on patients of a London hospital. He gives no details, but I unhesitatingly declare such abominable accusations to be false. He charges his fellow-countrymen with experi- menting on the incurably insane. But in the Journal of the American Medical Association, 1901, Professor Keen has al- 25 ready proved the "garbled and inaccurate" nature of this charge. The recent English libel action of Bayliss vs. Coler- idge has shown us how such anti-vivisectionist methods may be satisfactorily dealt with. I will merely express my sur- prise that a scientifically educated man can be found who ventures to make capital out of the popular aversion to "ex- periment," who ignores the fact that every advance in the art of healing must necessarily be "experimental" at the out- set. Dr Leffingwell tries to convict me of sympathy with Dr. Klein's attitude towards vivisection generally, because I presumably interpreted one of his answers before the Royal Commission. Dr Leffingwell has omitted to state that Dr. Klein vainly begged the Commissioners to amend his evi- dence, as "when under viva voce examination the fact of my being a foreigner made me often not able to appreciate all the purport of the questions which were asked of me, and that therefore my answers were not always such as I would have desired to give if I had quite understood the question." This letter and the amended evidence could hardly escape the careful reader's notice, as they are referred to in the first page of the report and are published at length in an appendix. The appendix throws an altogether different light on Dr. Klein's real attitude. Suffice it to say that my personal acquaintance with this eminent pathologist assures me that he is incapable of unnecessary cruelty. But what is Dr. Leffingwell's attitude in regard to vivi- section? He must be well aware that there is not a physi- cian of eminence at the present day who believes that ani- mals "are tortured to little or no purpose" for scientific ob- jects. Yet he attributes unverifiable quotations to the editor of the 'Lancet, which after special inquiry I have good rea- sons for doubting, and he mixes up modern with past opin- ions, thus successfully confusing the ignorant. But although he uses all the methods of the anti-vivisectionists, he has not the courage to decry vivisection "in certain phases." He does not choose to tell us what particular "phases" are to be condemned. He pretends that vivisections are shrouded in mystery and suggests that under present arrangements phys- iologists are in the habit of keeping secret the experiments so cruelly made by them on animals ! 26 COMMENTS ON MR. MYERS' REJOINDER. By Albert Leffingwell, M. D. Mr. Myers refers to certain "quotations" (there was but one) "attributed to the editor of the Lancet, which, after special inquiry, I have good reasons for doubting." It will be very easy to remove his doubts. The leading editorial in the Lancet of August 22, 1863, is a vigorous arraignment of vivisection as a method of teaching well-known facts. Said the editor of the Lancet : "The entire picture of vivi- sectional illustration of ordinary lectures is to us, personally, repulsive in the extreme. Look, for example, at the animal before us, stolen (to begin with) from his master"; and then follow the words which Mr. Myers imagined it was safe to doubt. "We repudiate the whole of this class of procedure," adds the writer of the Lancet editorial. And while Mr. Myers is verifying the accuracy of this quotation, if he will also take the trouble to look up the editorials on vivisection which appeared in the Lancet of August 11, i860; October 20, i860; February 6, 1875, and August 21, 1875 ; in the Medical Times and Gazette (London) of March 2, 1861, and August 16, 1862 ; in the British Medical Journal of May II, 1861; October 19, 1861 ; September 6, 1862; August 22, 1863; September 19, 1863; January 16, 1864, and June 11, 1864, he will see how the horrible cruelties that sometimes pertain to scientific experimentation upon animals were regarded by the medical profession of England a gen- eration ago. Mr. Myers calls these "past opinions." Since they relate to ethics, how do they cease to be of value be- cause forty years old? In my paper there was a line referring in the briefest way possible to Ringer's experiments in a London hospital, upon his unfortunate patients. Apparently Mr. Myers never heard of them; but he says, "I unhesitatingly declare such abominable accusations to be false," with a fervor that cer- tainly does credit to his heart. But suppose the abominable accusations are proven true, in what position does Mr. Myers then find himself? Nothing is more certain than that Dr. Ringer, in his work on "Therapeutics" and in medical jour- 27 / ; \ \ nals like the Lancet, stated that he had made such "experi- ments" ; among other poisons thus experimented with, and duly described, were muscarin, gelsemium and ethylatro- pium. In the Medical Times (London) for November lo, 1883, the editor thus refers to certain of Dr. Ringer's ex- pen: i' C i J "In publishing— and, indeed, in instituting their reckless experi- ments on the effect of nitrite of sodium on the human subject, Professor Ringer and Dr. Murrell ha\^ made i deplorably false move. ... It is impossible to read the paper in lit week's Lancet without distress. Of the eighteen adults to wh i!? Drs. Ringer and Murrell administered the drug in ten-gram doses all but one averred that they would expect to drop down dead if they ever took another dose. One woman fell to the ground and lay with throbbing head and nausea for three hours. The next series of experiments was with five-grain doses. The same results followed in ten out of sixteen cases. . . . Whatever credit may be given to Drs. Ringer and Murrell for scientific enthusiasm, it is impos- sible to acquit them of grave indiscretion. There will be a howi throughout the country if it comes out that officers of a public charity are in the habit of trying such useless and cruel experi- ments on the patients committed to their care." "Useless and cruel experiments on patients'' — that is the charge made agamst Dr. Ringer by a leading medical jour- nal of his own land. I did not stigmatize these experiments in any way ; that was done by his own countrymen. In bringing lorward the fact that the Royal Commission declined to permit Dr Klein to substitute his amended re- marks for his actual statements, I cannot see that Mr. Myers renders any great service to his physiological friend. A wruer takes accepted testimony, not rejected and discredited inventions. The inquiring reader should procure a copy of Dr. Klein's testimony, so far as it related to his personal . rrctices. and see if in Dr. Klein's replies to the questions asked him, he can discern the slightest evidence of inade- quate comprehension. If ^^Ir Myers thinks that reference to some army sur- geon's experience during the Boer War supplies the statistics of a country, for which I asked ; if he does not know that sacculation was carried on for nearly seventy years, inde- , en iently of calf-lymph, and that the vivisection of animals contributed nothing to Jenner's discovery ; if he fancies that 28 the freedom of Havana from yellow fever, — by no means so assured as when he wrote, — may be attributed to experi- ments on birds; if he believes that reference to certain al- leged cures of snake-bite by antivenene furnish me with evi- dence of decreased mortality in a nation like that of India, where 20,000 deaths from this cause annually occur, — then I fear that no amount of reasoning, within space available here, would convince him of his errors. If this discussion must close here, let it be on my part with an appreciation. Of Mr. Myers' sincerity and intellec- tud honesty I can have no doubt. Thirty-five years ago I should have written as he writes to-day, inspired by the de- lusion that science can make ethical laws for herself. And yet it is possible that were ours the opportunity of an ex- tended contrast of views, we should find not a few points of agreement. He would certainly discover that I am not an anti-vivisectionist ; and that everything in the way of pain- less experimentation seems to me as unobjectionable as to himself. On the other hand, I think I should be able to point out to him lines of vivisection, the cruelty and wicked- ness of which are so manifest, that, convinced of their ex- istence, he could not fail to condemn them as severely as did the editors of the British Medical Journal and the Lancet forty years ago. 29 (The following criticism is reprinted from the Journal of Philos- ophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods, of March i6, 1905, Vol. II, No. 6, pp. 157-159) The Vivisection Problem. {A Reply.) Albert Leffingwell, M.D. International Journal of Ethics, January, 1905^ pp. 221-231. The matter of the controversy over vivisection is continually at the focus of public attention, and this alone would sufficiently account for a great deal of its puerile treatment. Xo other current question affords a more vivid illustration of the osciliations of thought. The almost exact balance maintained between ^.pprobatiori on the ground cruelty, producing the putiHc about irrijurid of utility and disapprobation "n t much rluctuation of individual conv evenly divided. This article is written in reply to on Justifiable?' by C. S. Myers, of Gonville anc till keep- entitled, 'Ts Vivisection Caius College. Cam- bridge, published m the same journal, April, 1904. Mr. Myers, who poses as an unprejudiced arbitrator having gen- eral acquaintance with the principles of ethics and psychology, regis- ters an almost unqualified endorsement of the practice. He class- ifies the opponents of vivisection on moral grounds according to three standpoints, viz., the 'religious,' the 'common-sense' and the 'naturalistic' The first considers that animals are placed in the world by Divine Will and that man is their natural protector; it is an abuse of superior intelligence for man to inflict pain on them for any purpose whatever. The 'common-sense' antagonist, while opposing extreme cruelty, sanctions the infliction of a certain amount of pain upon animals, providing man's gain thereby is sufficiently great. The third standpoint, the 'naturalistic' condemns vivisection not so much on account of the pain endured by the animals, as on account of the reflex effect which cruelty has upon man. The arguments which Mr. Myers adduces in refutation of these respective positions are: that those who argue from the 'religious' standpoint are inconsistent when they sanction the slaughtering of cattle and the poisoning of vermin for the sake of increasing human comfort; that the 'common-sense' antagonist is ignorant of the great utihty of vivisection; and that the 'naturalistic' view does not take into account the truth of 'multiple-personality' which means that, while a vivisector may be humane on all other points, sympathy would be positively detrimental to success at the operating-table. This author cites the 'psychologist's fallacy' in refuting the charge of 'the sentimentalist' that vivisection involves the infliction of agony, saying that the cries and writhing of the animal-subjects are no criterion of true 'mental pain.' Besides, dogs have been observed to wag their tails and lick the hands of the operator, which evinces their indifference to the experiment. He further considers it needless to discuss the utility of vivisection, productive as it has been of such magnificent results in the study of microorganisms and the discovery of antitoxins. Typhoid and Mediterranean fever, diptheria, tuberculosis in cattle and snake-bite have been successfully combated with remedies perfected through vivisectional experiments. Dr. Leffingwell, himself a physician, is inclined to view the matter in another light. While laying no especial claim to knowledge of the principles of ethics and psychology, he doubts whether natural laws 30 ^ ' f are to be discovered and human welfare promoted at the expense of animal agony. The question of degree of pain is one of some importance to him. He says, "The impeachment of unlimited vivi- section rests wholly upon the conviction that in some of its phases it is productive of agony." The recognition of the value and moral legitimacy of definitely restricted vivisection should not blind one to the fact that, beyond certain limits, it becomes grossly immoral "That vivisected animals sometimes suffer, is a charge that rests wholly upon the evidence of men who are neither 'sentimentalists* nor 'la\Tnen,' but members of the medical profession. Speaking be- fore the British Medical Association at its annual meeting in 1899, the President of one of the sections, Dr. George Wilson, LL.D., made this remarkable charge: T have not allied myself to the anti- vivisectionists, but / accuse my profession of m^sicidin,: the public as to the cruelties and horrors which are p^-rpctrated on animal life. . . . Whether so-called toxins are injected under the skin, into the peritoneum, into the cranium, under the dura-mater, into the pleural cavity , into the veins, eyes, or other organs — and all these methods are ruthlessly practiced — there is long-drawn-out agony. The animal so innocently operated on may have to live days, weeks or months, with no anaesthetic to assauge its sufferings, and nothing but death to relieve.'" Dr. Henry J. Bigelow, LL.D., for many years a professor in Harvard Medical School, says : "The ground for public supervision is that vivisection, immeasurably beyond any other pursuit, involves the infliction of torture to little or no purpose." Dr. Leffingwell tends to believe, in spite of the psychologist's fallacy, that Mr. Myers' citation of dogs having been observed to wag their tails and lick the hands of the operator, betokens, not a happy animal indifference to fate, but rather a mute, instinctive and vain appeal for sympathy. Concerning the utility of vivisection. Dr. Leffingwell is by no means so sure as Mr, Myers. "Where are the proofs that the mor- tality from typhoid fever in any country has been reduced by the general use of the 'appropriate anti-toxin?' Where are we to look for similar evidence regarding mortality from Mediterranean or yel- low fever? Has the mortality from snake-bite 'been diminished in any appreciable degree by the employment of a remedy regarding whose use we are assured there is hardly a failure on record?' If so where are the statistics? There are none. It is a claim of the laboratory." Professor Hodge, of Clarke University, declared that "God clearly gives to man every sanction to cause any amount of physical pain which he may find expedient to unravel His laws." Dr. Leffingwell lacking the necessary general acquaintance with the principles of ethics, can not 'accept this enunciation of the vivisector's creed, and marvels that God should hide facts and give torture the right to find them. "What may we hope to accomplish in the reform of vivisection as it exists to-day? ... It seems to us that, first of all, there must be the gradual creation of public sentiment which shall be eager, not so much to approve all vivisection, or to disapprove it all, as to know with certainty the facts. Take, for example, the ques- 31 tion of vivisection in institutions of learning. To what extent is It earned on, merely to demonstrate what every student knows in advance? . . . The removal of the secrecy that so generally en- shrouds vtmsection is the first and most important step toward anv true reform. [My italics.] '*And finally there must come the regulation of vhUertlon hy law .. . The hzv nught to hrin^ u^^n official records the numher 'ot ex- rmed, the uOjecis which were m new, the results nned, the species of animal upon ivhieh the invesUm h f f I »>» ,,' yi '/"!?< y-^fp n *■•■:, ling tnai This is a nu: article to take made, the anaestnettcs which were administered, and rtains to the Prevention of pain, [My italics. • iiiniir; 0, in th r,-:- U)! notice of RNAL I belie V Leffi.newe e. however, that it is justified Further, I would suggest that that article be copied verbatim magazines interested in the oromotion of liiimanJfnr; .,. ...,, promotion of humanitanai principle> a A more philosophic treatment of what has unfortunate^ . very much confused subject, it has not been my fortune to a - vf r a more concise indication of the ends toward which ref >rrn ^hn ^^d be^ Its energies has not vet appeared in print, I concf iv- tirr ?> Leffingwell's reply, m the thoughts of all right-minded Dersons, will consig! ethical in as . ten^ t''«r A istries as are contained paper to the limbo of eternal scorn. Yiv-^ectaoi. ing for immediate soiut on does not demand a i of the principles of ethics and psychology'; h ah acceptance of our direct intimations of its evils. Goethe, "knows what he is doing while he acts arighr IS wrong we are ahvavs conscious." Those who. in thi subordinate the pra tical impulse toward the aileviation «? woes to the logical demonstration of its validity, would o read Aristotle on the golden mean. Publicity and rest ♦ fnni.w"'^Tl!'°"' '' ^^ ^^^-TJ^. ^^ ^'- Leffingwell's' appeal, .n appeal to which every one should lend support. .Mr. M'vers' oaldem call- knowledge I pragmatic 'laie, >a\■^ '01 .;.'i what of animal wed it:; rao nio Columbia University. Philip Hyatt T Al?t 32 / ,'^-' *.'. k \^ 1% a¥1 ^•....-' J- i-.i i_rf V-^ Iwi l_w >»^ A c'ive and bequeath the sum of. 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