"Join a really effective Society with a frank and straightforward policy—namely, the London Anti-vivisection Society, 13 Regent Street, London, S.W. This is a National and International organisation. It has greater medical support than any other. It is the most 'alive' humane organisation in the world.... Get into touch with the society. Write to us. We shall be glad to hear from you and answer any questions."
"If you can provide for the Society's future in your Will, may we beg of you to do so? If you agree, pray do it now. Thousands of pounds have been lost to the Society and the Cause by the fatal procrastination of well-meaning friends. The pity of it! Legacies should be left in these exact words: 'To the London Anti-vivisection Society.' Caution. It is of great importance to describe very accurately the Title of this Society—namely, The LONDON Anti-vivisection Society—otherwise the benevolent intentions of the Donor may be frustrated. Please Note.—Those charitable persons who have left money to the Society would do well to notify the same to the Secretary."
Contrast the tone of this appeal for money with the tone of the Report:——
"Your Society are glad to note that the Christian Churches are becoming alarmed at the pretensions of scientific authority.... The Christian laity has been largely uninstructed or misinformed on this grave question.... Happily, the signs of the times are propitious; not all of the leaders of religious thought in this country have succumbed to the dictation and pretensions of the professors of vivisection ... a base and blatant materialism, a practice which owes its inception to barbarism, and which has developed in materialism of the lowest possible order."
Surely such eloquence should avail to tear the money even out of the hands of the dying, lest the National Society should get it. The National Society, oddly enough, also says: "Caution.—It is of great importance to describe very accurately the Title of this Society—namely, The National Anti-vivisection Society—otherwise the benevolent intentions of the Donor may be frustrated." I do not know which of these two societies is the inventor of this phrase. Still, it is not improbable that the National Society receives more money than all the smaller societies together. Of course, we cannot compare the working expenses of an anti-vivisection society with the working expenses of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, or the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. The former of these two societies in one year obtained 8798 convictions; in one month alone, 689 convictions; and it paid the full costs of committing 34 of the 689 to prison. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children has an equally good record. But an anti-vivisectionist society cannot show results of this kind. Nor can we compare its working expenses to those of a missionary society; for the missionaries give direct personal service to their fellow-men. But we can fairly compare an anti-vivisection society to an anti-vaccination society or a Church of Christian Science. That is to say, it is a publishing body. In 1902, the National Society's expenditure, in round numbers, was £970 on printing and stationery; £1193 on rent, salaries, and wages; £1255 on books, newspapers, periodicals, &c., including the Illustrated Catalogue and the Hospital Guide; £1380 on lectures, meetings, organising new branches, &c.; and about £500 on all other expenses. Let us take, to illustrate these figures, what the National Society says from time to time in its official journal:—
June 1899.—(From the Society's Annual Report): "The whole controversy has been collected and published in pamphlet form by your Society, and more than 10,000 copies have already been issued to the public. Over 200 people have joined your ranks and become members of the Society in consequence of it, while two cheques of £1000 each were received by Mr. Coleridge in aid of the cause."
June 1899.—"We have received more money within the past six months than we got in any two years previously."
June 1899.—"We cannot better employ the funds at our disposal than in securing the constant help of experts to insure the accuracy of all our statements, and in sending well-informed lecturers to every city in the kingdom."
June 1900.—(From the Society's Annual Report): "The receipts of the society from subscriptions and donations show an increase over those of the previous year. This increase in itself, however, would hardly have justified the increase in the expenses which it has been found necessary to incur in almost every department, and especially in the distribution of pamphlets and papers, had it not been for some legacies which fell due, notably one from——, of £6386."
May 1901.—"With heartfelt gratitude we have once more to announce that the National Society has received a gift of a thousand pounds from an anonymous donor. Nothing could be more opportune for the Cause than this munificent support, coming as it does just as the issue of 20,000 copies of Mr. Stephen Coleridge's Hospital Guide has been made at so great a cost to the Society."