Plea for mercy to animals / by James Macauley.

  • James Macaulay
Date:
[1875]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Plea for mercy to animals / by James Macauley. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    be regarded not only as a right but as a trust. On this point we quote some sentences from a remarkable speech by the great Lord Erskine, when he was trying to induce the Grovernment of his day to legislate for the protection of animals from cruelty : “ That the dominion of man over the lower world is a moral trust, is a proposition which no man living can deny, without denying the whole foundation of our duties. If in the examina- tion of the qualities, powers, and instincts of animals, we could discover nothing else but their admirable and wonderful con- struction for man’s assistance ; if we found no organs in the animals for their own gratification and happiness,—no sensibility to pain or pleasure,—no grateful sense of kindness, nor sufiering from neglect or injury,—no senses analogous, though inferior to oui’ own ; if we discovered, in short, nothing but mere animated matter, obviously and. exclusively subservient to human pur- poses, it would be difficult to maintain that the dominion over them was a trust: in any other sense at least than to make the best use for ourselves of the property in those which Providence had given us. But it calls for no deep or extended skill in natural history to know that the very reverse of this is the case, and that God is the benevolent and impartial author of all that He has created. For every animal which comes in contact with man, and whose powers and qualities and instincts are obviously adapted to his use, Nature has taken care to provide, arid as carefully and bountifully as for man himself, organs and feelings for its own enjoyment and happiness.” “ The animals are given for our use, but not for our abuse. Their freedom and enjoyments, when they cease to be consistent with our just dominion and enjoyments, can be no part of their natural rights ; but whilst they are consistent, their rights, subservient as they are, ought to be as sacred as our own.”
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