A more vigorous denunciation of the cruelty of vivisection never appeared than these words of the first scholar of the English- speaking world. Of course the plea will be put forth that in Dr. Johnson's time the use of anaesthetics was unknown. Are we, then, to conclude that the present-day defenders of absolute freedom in animal research would join him in condemning the perpetrators of ALL EXPERIMENTS CAUSING DISTRESS IN WHICH ANAESTHETICS CANNOT BE EMPLOYED? For the merit of Dr. Johnson's plea lies in this, THAT HE MAKES ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS OF HIGHER IMPORTANCE THAN THE DISCOVERY OF PHYSIOLOGICAL FACTS. "If the knowledge of physiology has been somewhat increased, he surely buys knowledge dear who learns the use of the lacteals at the expense of his own humanity." Is there a physiological defenders of vivisection-freedom living to-day who would accept Dr. Johnson's conclusion, that one should forbear research which is possible only by the infliction of animal torment? How unfair it is, therefore, to suggest that the force of Dr. Johnson's argument is invalidated because anaesthetics were unknown—when the disagreement is infinitely deeper!
To what physiologists of his time did Dr. Johnson allude? Apparently his denunciation was sweeping; he referred to "a race of wretches" rather than to any particular individual, and to experiments then carried on and "published every day with ostentation." Who were the men thus stigmatized? We do not know. The record of their useless tormenting has sunk into the oblivion that hides their names; there are but one or two whose identity may perhaps be guessed. It is possible that one of them was John Hunter; yet Hunter did not go up to London until 1764, and Dr. Johnson's condemnation had appeared three years earlier. Still, this does not preclude the possibility that Dr. Johnson had Hunter in his mind.
In some ways John Hunter was a remarkable man. He made an anatomical collection, which is still in existence and which bears his name. At Earl's Court, then a suburb of London, he established a sort of zoological Inferno, that reminds one of the "Island of Dr. Moreau." One of his biographers, Ottley, tells us that Hunger "TOOK SUPREME DELIGHT" in his physiological experiments; and inasmuch as he suggested in a letter to a friend the performance of the most agonizing experiments as likely to "amuse" him, the statement was undoubtedly true. A man's occupation generally has an influence upon his character, and Hunter's biographer rather hesitatingly admits that "he was not always very nice in his choice of associates," and that among his companions were certain abominable wretches known as "resurrection men," who robbed graveyards for the benefit of students of anatomy. Under all circumstances, we can hardly be surprised that his married life was anything but serene.
In the infliction of pain he seems to have been without any idea of pity. To a friend who asked for his experience in a certain matter, he wrote:
"I thank you for your experiment on the hedgehog; but WHY DO YOU ASK ME A QUESTION, by the way of solving it? I think your solution is just, but why—WHY NOT TRY THE EXPERIMENT? Repeat all the experiments upon a hedgehog as soon as you receive this, and they will give you the solution. TRY THE HEAT. CUT OFF A LEG…and let me know the result of the whole. "Ever yours, "JOHN HUNTER."
Even his own word, or the result of his own observations, he did not wish to have accepted, when, merely at the cost of another tortured animal, his friend could find the answer for himself. Is not this the physiological ideal of to-day?
Again he writes to his scientific friend:
"If you could make some experiments on the increased heat of inflammation, I should be obliged to you…. I opened the thorax of a dog between two ribs, and introduced the thermometer. Then I put some lint into the wound to keep it from healing by the first intention, THAT THE THORAX MIGHT INFLAME; but before I had time to try it again, my dog died on the fourth day. A deep wound might be made into the thick of a dog's thigh, then put in the thermometer and some extraneous matter…. IF THESE EXPERIMENTS WILL AMUSE YOU, I should be glad they were made; but take care you do not break your thermometer in the dog's chest."[1]
[1] Barron's "Life of Jenner," i. 44.
"IF THESE EXPERIMENTS WILL AMUSE YOU"—what a suggestive confirmation of Dr. Johnson's charge that the torture of vivisection was then regarded as an "amusement"! A century after, an Italian physiologist, Mantegazza, devoted a year to the infliction of extreme torment upon animals, and confessed that his tortures were inflicted, not with hesitation or repugnance, but "CON MULTO AMORE," with extreme delight.[2]