Читать книгу An Ethical Problem - Albert 1845-1916 Leffingwell - Страница 5

It is now somewhat over a third of a century since my attention was specially directed to the abuses of animal experimentation. In January, 1880, a paragraph appeared in a morning paper of New York referring to the late Henry Bergh. With his approval a Bill had come before the legislature of the State of New York providing for the abolition of all experiments upon living animals—whether in medical colleges or elsewhere—on the ground that they were without benefit to anybody, and demoralizing alike to the teacher and student. As I dropped the paper, it occurred to me that the chances of success would have been far greater if less had been asked. That certain vivisections were atrocious was undoubtedly true; but, on the other hand, there were some experiments that were absolutely painless. Would it not be wiser to make some distinctions?

The attempt was made. An article on the subject was at once begun, and in July of the same year it was published in Scribner's Magazine, the predecessor of the Century. So far as known, it was the first argument that ever found expression in the pages of any American periodical favouring not the entire abolition of vivisection, but the reform of its abuse.

My knowledge of vivisection had its beginning in personal experience. Nearly forty years ago, while teaching the elements of physiology at the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, it occurred to me to illustrate the statements of textbooks by a repetition of such simple experiments as had come before my own eyes. Most of my demonstrations were illustrative of commonplace physiological phenomena: chloroform was freely used to secure unconsciousness of the animal, and with the exception of one or two demonstrations, the avoidance of pain or distress was almost certainly accomplished.

But what especially impressed me at the time was the extraordinary interest which these experiments seemed to excite. Students from advanced classes in the institute were often spectators and voluntary assistants. Of the utility of such demonstrations as a means of fixing facts in memory, I could not have the slightest doubt. Nor as regards the rightfulness of vivisection as a method either of study or demonstration, was there at that period any question in my mind. Whatever Science desired, it seemed to me only proper that Science should have. The fact that certain demonstrations or experiments upon living animals had already been condemned as unjustifiable cruelty by the leading men in the medical profession, and by some of the principal medical journals of England, was then as utterly unknown to me as the same facts are to-day unknown to the average graduate of every medical school in the United States. It was not long until after this early experience, and following acquaintance with the practice in Europe as well as at home, that doubts arose regarding the justice of CAUSING PAIN TO ILLUSTRATE FACTS ALREADY KNOWN. These doubts became convictions, and were stated in my first contribution to the literature of the subject, the paper in Scribner's. It is not the position of what is called "antivivisection," for that implies condemnation of every phase of animal experimentation. In the third of a century that has elapsed since this protest was made, the practice of vivisection has taken vast strides: it appears in new shapes and unanticipated environment. But the old abuses have not disappeared, and some of them, more urgently than ever before, demand the attention of thinking men and women.

Of personal contributions to the literature of the subject, during the past third of a century, nearly everything has been more or less polemical, called forth by either exaggeration of utility, inaccuracy of assertion, or misstatement of fact. Now it has been protest against the brilliant correspondent of a New York newspaper, who telegraphed from London an account of a visit to a well-known physiological laboratory, where he found animals all "fat, cheerful, and jolly," yet "quite unaffected by the removal of a spinal cord"—as sensible a statement as if he had referred to their jolly condition "after removal of their heads." Now it has been the manifesto of professors in a medical school declaring that in the institution to which they belonged no painful experiments had been performed—an assertion abundantly contradicted by their own publications. Now it is a Surgeon-General of the Army, defending one of the most cruel of vivisections in which he was not in any way concerned, by an exposition of ignorance regarding the elements of physiology; and, again, it has been a President of a medical association, making a speech, wherein hardly a sentence was not stamped with inaccuracy and ignorance. To some natures controversy is exhilarating; to myself it is beyond expression distasteful. Yet, when confronted by false affirmations, what is one's duty? To say nothing? To permit the untruth to march triumphantly on its way? Or, in the interest of Science herself, should not one attempt the exposure of inaccuracy, and the demonstration of the truth?

Approaching the end of a long pilgrimage, it has seemed to me worth while to make a final survey of the great question of our time. How was the cruelty of vivisection once regarded by the leading members of the medical profession? Shall we say to-day that the utility of torment, in the vivisection of animals, constitutes perfect justification and defence? How far did Civilization once go in the approval of torture because of its imagined deterrent effects?

What has been accomplished by the agitation concerning vivisection which has persisted for the last forty years? Has the battlefield been well selected? Have demands of reformers been wisely formulated? Is public opinion to-day inclined to be any more favourable to the legal abolition of all scientific experimentation upon animals than it was a third of a century ago?

What has been the result of vivisection in America, unrestricted and unrestrained? Has it accomplished anything for the human race that might not have been accomplished under conditions whereby cruelty should be impossible except as a crime? Has the death-rate been reduced by new discoveries made in American laboratories? Is it possible that utility is persistently exaggerated by those who are not unwilling to use exaggeration as a means of defence? And of the Future, what are the probabilities for which we may hope? What is being done in our century in the way of submitting animals to unlimited torture?

To throw somewhat of light on these questions is the object of this volume. I wish it had been in my power to write a more extended and complete exposition of the problem, but limitations of strength, due to advancing age, have made that hope impracticable. But as one man drops the torch, another hand will grasp it; and where now is darkness and secrecy, there will one day be knowledge and light.