Cruelty to animals : the speech of Lord Erskine, in the House of Peers, on the second reading of the Bill preventing malicious and wanton cruelty to animals taken in short hand.

  • Thomas Erskine, 1st Baron Erskine
Date:
1809
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Cruelty to animals : the speech of Lord Erskine, in the House of Peers, on the second reading of the Bill preventing malicious and wanton cruelty to animals taken in short hand. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    are inseparable characteristics of their natures as much as of our own. Add to (his, my Lords, that the justest and tenderest consideration of this benevolent system of Nature is not only consistent ■with the fullest dominion of Man over the lower world, but establishes and improves it. In this, as in every thing else, the whole moral sys- tem is inculcated by the pursuit of our own happiness. In this, as in all other things, our duties and our interests arc inseparable. I defy any man to point out any one abuse of a brute which is property, by its owner, which is not directly against his own interest. Is it possible then, my Lords,to contemplate this wonderful arrange- ment, and to doubt for a single moment that our do- minion over animals is a trust ? They are created in- deed for our use, but not for our abuse. Their free- dom and enjoyments, when they cease to be consistent with our just dominion and enjoyments, can be no part of iheir natures; but whilst they are consistent, I say their rights, subservient as they are, ought to be as sacred as our own. And although certainly, my Lords, there can be no law for Man in that respect, but such as he makes for himself, yet I cannot conceive any thing more sub- lime, or interesting, more grateful to Heaven, or more beneficial to earth, than to see such a spontaneous re- straint imposed by Man upon himself. This subject is most justly treated by one of the best poets in our language. Mr. Cow per in the Task says:— The sum is this If man’s Convenience, health, or safety interfere, his rights and claims are paramount, and must extinguish theirsj, else they are all I
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