On Vivisection

British Medical Journal, 2/18/2005
The very idea that one species could serve as a model for a different species ignores the basic principles of biology.[TOP]

George Bernard Shaw, 1856-1950
You do not settle whether an experiment is justified or not by merely showing that it is of some use. The distinction is not between useful and useless experiments, but between barbarous and civilized behavior. Vivisection is a social evil because if it advances human knowledge, it does so at the expense of human character. [TOP]

Robert Browning
1812-1889 (from a letter)
I despise and abhor the pleas on behalf of that infamous practice, vivisection. I would rather submit to the worst of deaths, so far as pain goes, than have a single dog or cat tortured on the pretense of sparing me a twinge or two. [TOP]

Charles Dickens, 1812-1870
A Christmas Carol
The necessity for these experiments I dispute. Man has no right to gratify an idle and purposeless curiosity through the practice of cruelty. [TOP]

Richard Wagner, 1813-1883
If vivisection should spread, then there will be one thing at least for which to thank its advocates: although the Deutsches Requiem will not be played for us when we pass away, we shall be glad and willing to leave a world in which not a dog would want to live. [TOP]

William Shakespeare, 1564-1616
Cymbeline, Act I, Scene 5
Queen: I will try the forces
Of these thy compounds on such creatures as
We count not worth the hanging—but none human ...
Cornelius: Your Highness Shall from this practice but make hard your heart. [TOP]

Adlai Stevenson, 1900-1965
Putting First Things First
It is difficult to picture the great Creator conceiving of a program of one creature (which He has made) using another living creature for purposes of experimentation. There must be other, less cruel ways of obtaining knowledge. [TOP]

Carl Gustav Jung, 1875-1961
Collected Works
During my medical education at the University of Basle, I found vivisection horrible, barbarous and above all, unnecessary. [TOP]

Lewis Carroll, 1832-1898
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Forbid the day when vivisection shall be practiced in every college and school, and when the man of science, looking forth over a world which will then own no other sway than his, shall exult in the thought that he had made of this fair earth, if not a heaven for man, at least a hell for animals. [TOP]

Dr. George Hoggan (assistant to vivisector Claude Bernard)
I am of the opinion that not one of those experiments on animals was justified or necessary. ... I witnessed many harsh sights, but I think the saddest was when the dogs were brought up from the cellar to the laboratory. Instead of appearing pleased with the change from darkness to light, they seemed seized with horror as soon as they smelt the air of the place, apparently divining their approaching fate ... Hundreds of times I have seen when an animal writhed in pain, it would receive a slap, and an angry order to be quiet and behave itself ... To this recital I need hardly add that, having drunk the cup to the dregs, I cry off, and am prepared to see not only science, but even mankind, perish rather than have recourse to such means of saving it. [TOP]

Dr. Henry J. Bigelow, 1818-1890
Vivisection makes medical students less tender of sufferings, begets indifference to it, and deadens their humanity. [TOP]

Luther Burbank, 1849-1926 Their very weakness and inability to protest demands that man should refrain from torturing animals for the mere possibility of obtaining some knowledge. [TOP]

Mahatma Gandhi, 1869-1948
Vivisection is the [most evil] of all the [evil] crimes that man is at present committing against God and His fair creation. It ill becomes us to invoke in our daily prayers the blessings of God, the Compassionate, if we in turn will not practice elementary compassion toward our fellow creatures. ... I abhor vivisection with my whole soul. All the scientific discoveries stained with innocent blood I count as of no consequence. [TOP]

Mark Twain, 1835-1910
What is Man?
I believe I am not interested to know whether vivisection produces results that are profitable to the human race or doesnÌt. To know that the results are profitable to the race would not remove my hostility to it. The pain which it inflicts upon unconsenting animals is the basis of my enmity toward it, and it is to me sufficient justification to the enmity without looking further. [TOP]

Count Leo Tolstoy, 1828-1910
(from a letter)
What I think about vivisection is that if people admit that they have the right to take or endanger the life of living beings for the benefit of many, there will be no limit for their cruelty. [TOP]

John Vyvyan, 1908-1975
The Dark Face of Science
Knowledge without pity may well be the greatest danger that besets the world. [TOP]

Voltaire, 1694-1778
Philosophical Dictionary
Judge the behavior of a dog who has lost his master, who has searched for him in the road barking miserably, who has come back to the house, restless and anxious, who has run upstairs and down, from room to room, and who has found the beloved master at last in his study, and then shown his joy by barks, bounds and caresses. There are some barbarians who will take this dog, that so greatly excels man in capacity for friendship, who will nail him to a table, and dissect him alive. And what you discover in him are the same organs of sensation you have in yourself. [TOP]

C.S. Lewis
Vivisection (1947)
The victory of vivisection marks a great advance in the triumph of ruthless, non-moral utilitarianism over the old world of ethical law; a triumph in which we, as well as animals, are already the victims … In justifying cruelty to animals, we put ourselves on the animal level. We choose the jungle and must abide by our choice. [TOP]

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