Читать книгу An Ethical Problem - Albert 1845-1916 Leffingwell - Страница 9

It may be doubted whether any physiologist has ever lived whose cruelty to animals exceeded that which, for a long period, was exercised by Franc,ois Magendie. Born at Bordeaux, France, in 1783, just before the beginning of the French Revolution, he studied medicine, receiving his medical degree in the year 1808. Entering with some zest upon the study of physiology, he published several pamphlets regarding his investigations, and rapidly earned that notoriety—which for some natures is the equivalent of fame—for the peculiar and refined torments which, in public demonstrations, he took frequent occasion to inflict. In 1821 he was elected a member of the Institute; in 1831 he had become a professor in the College de France, a position he held for the remainder of his life. He died in 1855.

One of the earliest exposures of Magendie's infamous vivisections was made in the British Parliament. On February 24, 1825, Mr. Richard Martin of Galway, an Irish Member of the House of Commons, moved to bring in a Bill for the repression of bear-baiting and other forms of cruelty to animals. His name is worth remembering, for to this Richard Martin belongs the honour of being one of the first men in any land who attempted to secure some repression of cruelty to animals through the condemnation of the law. During his speech on this occasion Mr. Martin said:

"It was not merely bear-baiting and sports of a similar character that he wished to abolish; there were other practices, equally cruel, with which he thought the legislature ought to interfere. There was a Frenchman by the name of Magendie, whom he considered a disgrace to Society. In the course of the last year this man, at one of his anatomical theatres, exhibited a series of experiments so atrocious as almost to shock belief. This M. Magendie got a lady's greyhound. First of all he nailed its front, and then its hind, paws with the bluntest spikes that he could find, giving as reason that the poor beast, in its agony, might tear away from the spikes if they were at all sharp or cutting. He then doubled up its long ears, and nailed them down with similar spikes. (Cries of `Shame!') He then made a gash down the middle of the face, and proceeded to dissect all the nerves on one side of it. … After he had finished these operations, this surgical butcher then turned to the spectators, and said: `I have now finished my operations on one side of this dog's head, and I shall reserve the other side till to-morrow. If the servant takes care of him for the night, I am of the opinion that I shall be able to continue my operations upon him to-morrow with as much satisfaction to us all as I have done to-day; but if not, ALTHOUGH HE MAY HAVE LOST THE VIVACITY HE HAS SHOWN TO-DAY, I shall have the opportunity of cutting him up alive, and showing you the motion of the heart.' Mr. Martin added that he held in his hands the written declarations of Mr. Abernethy, of Sir Everard Home (and of other distinguished medical men), all uniting in condemnation of such excessive and protracted cruelty as had been practised by this Frenchman."[1]

[1] Hansard's Parliamentary Reports, February 24, 1825.

Within the past forty years has the cruelty of Magendie been condemned by any English or American physiologist? I have never seen it.

The objection is sometimes raised that evidence like this of Magendie's cruelty is only "hearsay." Is not this generally the case where inhumanity is concerned? When Wilberforce described the atrocities of the African slave trade, or Shaftesbury the conditions pertaining to children in coal-mines and cotton mills, their statements were equally questioned; yet, when reform had been accomplished, nobody doubted that, although they had not personally witnessed the cruelties, they had reported only the facts. Now, one peculiarity of Magendie's vivisections WAS THEIR PUBLICITY. There was no attempt at concealment, such as governs the practice in England and America to-day. Magendie's experiments were publicly made, seemingly with a desire to parade his contempt for any sentiment of compassion towards animals. The evidence of Magendie's cruelty is supported by an overwhelming amount of evidence, and to Mr. Martin's account of his vivisections, none of Magendie's English friends or apologists ever ventured to reply in the public journals of the day.

An English physician, Dr. John Anthony, a pupil of Sir Charles Bell and a strong advocate of vivisection, has given us a little account of his personal experience in 1838, while a student of medicine in Paris. The English members of his class, he says, "were indignant at the CRUELTIES which we saw manifested IN THE DEMONSTRATION OF EXPERIMENTS ON LIVING CREATURES. … What I saw in Paris pointed to this: that very frequently men who are in the habit of making these experiments are very careless of what becomes of the animal when it has served its purpose; … the animal is thrown (aside) to creep into a corner and die. … I have carefully avoided seeing experiments in vivisection after the awful dose which I had of it in Paris, in 1838. THE MEN THERE SEEMED TO CARE NO MORE FOR THE PAIN OF THE CREATURE BEING OPERATED UPON THAN IF IT WERE SO MUCH INORGANIC MATTER."[1]

[1] Vivisection Report, 1876, Questions 2,347, 2,447, 2,582.

Another witness of Magendie's cruelty was Dr. William Sharpey, LL.D., Fellow of the Royal Society, and for more than thirty years the professor of physiology in University College, London. It is a curious fact that the "Handbook of the Physiological Laboratory," which, when published in 1871, increased the agitation against vivisection, was dedicated to Professor Sharpey. Before the Royal Commission on Vivisection, in 1876, he gave the following account of his personal experience:

"When I was a very young man, studying in Paris, I went to the first of a series of lectures which Magendie gave upon experimental physiology; and I was so utterly repelled by what I witnessed that I never went again. In the first place, they were painful (in those days there were no anaesthetics), and sometimes they were severe; and then THEY WERE WITHOUT SUFFICIENT OBJECT. For example, Magendie made incisions into the skin of rabbits and other creatures TO SHOW THAT THE SKIN IS SENSITIVE! Surely all the world knows the skin is sensitive; no experiment is wanted to prove that. Several experiments he made were of a similar character, AND HE PUT THE ANIMALS TO DEATH, FINALLY, IN A VERY PAINFUL WAY. … Some of his experiments excited a strong feeling of abhorrence, not in the public merely, but among physiologists. There was his—I was going to say `famous' experiment; it might rather have been called `INFAMOUS' experiment upon vomiting. … Besides its atrocity, it was really purposeless."[2]

[2] Evidence before Royal Commission, 1875, Questions 444, 474.

Of Magendie's cruelty we have thus the evidence of the best-known English physiologist of his day. Even by his own countrymen Magendie's pitilessness was denounced. Dr. Latour, the founder and editor of the leading medical journal of France—L'Union Me'dicale—has given us an incident which occurred in his presence, translations of which appeared in the editorial columns of the London Lancet and the British Medical Journal, August 22, 1863.

"I recall to mind a poor dog, the roots of whose vertebral nerves Magendie desired to lay bare to demonstrate Bell's theory, which he claimed as his own. The dog, already mutilated and bleeding, twice escaped from under the implacable knife, and threw his forepaws around Magendie's neck, licking, as if to soften his murderer and ask for mercy! Vivisectors may laugh, but I confess I was unable to endure that heartrending spectacle."[1]

[1] The London Lancet, August 22, 1863.

The proof of Magendie's ferocious cruelty to his victims seems overwhelming. "In France," says Dr. George Wilson, "some of the most eminent physiologists have gained an unenviable notoriety as PITILESS TORTURERS, … experimenters who would not take the trouble to put out of pain the wretched dogs on which they experimented, even after they had served their purpose, but left them to perish of lingering torture. … It is pleasing to contrast the merciless horrors enacted by Magendie"—with the reluctance manifested by Sir Charles Bell.[2] Dr. Elliotson, in his work on Human Physiology, states that "Magendie cut living animals here and there, with no definite object BUT TO SEE WHAT WOULD HAPPEN."[3] In a sermon on cruelty to animals, preached at Edinburgh, March 5, 1826, by the Rev. Dr. Chalmers, the speaker especially alludes to "THE ATROCITIES OF A MAGENDIE," then recently made known in England. The President of the Royal College of Surgeons, Sir James Paget, once testified that Magendie "disgusted people very much BY SHOWING CONTEMPT FOR THE PAIN OF ANIMALS."[1] The great scientist, Charles Darwin, in a letter to the London Times, made reference to Magendie as a physiologist "NOTORIOUS, half a century ago, FOR HIS CRUEL EXPERIMENTS." "It is not to be denied that inhumanity may be found in persons of very high position as physiologists. WE HAVE SEEN THAT IT WAS SO IN MAGENDIE." This is the language of the final report of the Commission, to which was affixed the name of Professor Thomas Henry Huxley, the most brilliant scientific writer of the last century.

[2] Wilson's "Life of Reid," p. 165. [3] "Human Physiology," p. 428. [1] Evidence before Royal Commission, 1875, Question 371.

Magendie left us a singularly truthful estimate of his own character and of his scientific accomplishments when he declared himself to be simply "a street scavenger (un chiffonier) of science. With my hook in my hand and my basket on my back, I ramble about the streets of science and gather up whatever I can find." The comparison was singular, but it was apt; he was, indeed, the ragpicker of physiology. With a scavenger's sense of honour he endeavored to rob Sir Charles Bell of the credit for his discovery concerning the functions of the spinal nerves, by a prodigality of torment, from which the nobler nature of the English scientist instinctively recoiled. When there came to him an opportunity of experimenting on man, he embraced it with avidity, and again and again, while operating for cataract, plunged his needle to the bottom of the patient's eye, that he might learn the effect of mechanical irritation of the delicate organ of sight.[1] Some rags and tatters of physiology he bought—at the price of immeasurable torment—and held them up for the admiration of his contemporaries; but in the great conflict with disease and death it may be questioned whether he added a single fact that has increased the potency of medical art, the length of human life, or the sum of human happiness.