and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moves upon the earth. And when the earth is to be replenished after the deluge, the same privileges are again granted to him. The fear of man and the dread of man shall be upon all living creatures, into his hand are they all delivered, they shall all be meat for him. And they are given over to his supreme and irresponsible control without the slightest injunction of kindness or the faintest suggestion of any duties towards them. They are to be regarded by him simply as food. Among the Hebrews the harshness of this anthropocentric doctrine was somewhat mitigated by the sympathy which a simple pastoral and agricultural people naturally feels for its domestic animals. In Christianity, on the other hand, it was further strengthened by the exclusive importance which was attached to the spiritual salvation of man. He was now more than ever separated from the rest of sentient beings. Even his own animal nature was regarded with contempt, the immortality of his soul being the only object of religious interest. "It would seem," says Dr. Arnold, " as if the primitive Christian, by laying so much stress upon a future life in contradistinction to this life, and placing the lower creatures out of the pale of hope, placed them at the same time out of the pale of sympathy, and thus laid the foundation for this utter disregard of animals in the light of our fellow-creatures." 4 St. Paul asks with scorn, "Doth God take care for oxen?" 5 No creed in Christendom teaches kindness to animals as a dogma of religion." In the Middle Ages various councils of the Church declared hunting unlawful for the clergy;" but the obvious reason for this prohibition was its horror of bloodshed, not any consideration for the animals. 1 Genesis, i. 28. 2 Ibid. ix. 2 sq. 3 Cf. Evans, Ethical Relations between Man and Beast,' in Popular Science Monthly, xlv. 637 sq. Arnold, quoted by Evans, in Popular Science Monthly, xlv. 639. 5 I Corinthians, ix. 9. 6 The Manichæans prohibited all killing of animals (Baur, Das Manichäische Religionssystem, p. 252 sqq.); but Manichæism did not originate on Christian ground (Harnack, Manichæism,' in Encyclopædia Britannica, xv. 485; supra, ii. 312). Le Grand d'Aussy, Histoire de la vie privée des François, i. 394 sq. s Supra, i. 381 sq. 2 Mr. Mauleverer in Sir Arthur Helps' Talk about Animals and their Masters,' says, "Upon a moderate calculation, I think I have heard, in my time, 1320 sermons; and I do not recollect that in any one of them I ever heard the slightest allusion made to the conduct of men towards animals."1 Nor is there any such allusion in most treatises on Ethics which base their teachings upon distinctly Christian tenets. The kindest words, I think, which from a Christian point of view have been said about animals have generally come from Protestant sectarians, Quakers and Methodists, whereas Roman Catholic writers-with a few exceptions 3, when they deal with the subject at all, chiefly take pains to show that animals are entirely destitute of rights. Brute beasts, says Father Rickaby, cannot have any rights for the reason that they have no understanding and therefore are not persons. We have no duties of any kind to them, as neither to stocks and stones; we only have duties about them. We must not harm them when they are our neighbour's property, we must not vex and annoy them. for sport, because it disposes him who does so inhumanity towards his own species. But there is no shadow of evil resting on the practice of causing pain to brutes in sport, where the pain is not the sport itself, but an incidental concomitant of it. Much more in all that conduces to the sustenance of man may we give pain to animals, and we are not " bound to any anxious care. to make this pain as little as may be. Brutes are as things in our regard so far as they are useful to us, they exist for us, not for themselves; and we do right in using them unsparingly for our need and convenience, though not for our wantonness." 4 According to another 1 modern Catholic writer the infliction of suffering upon an animal is not only justifiable, but a duty, "when it confers a certain, a solid good, however small, on the spiritual nature of man." Pope Pius IX. refused a request for permission to form in Rome a Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals on the professed ground that it was a theological error to suppose that man owes any duty to an animal.2 3 It is not only theological moralists that maintain that animals can have no rights and that abstinence from wanton cruelty is a duty not to the animal but to man. This view has been shared by Kant and by many later philosophers. So also the legal protection of animals has often been vindicated merely on the ground that cruelty to animals might breed cruelty to men or shows a cruel disposition of mind," or that it wounds the sensibilities of other people. In Parliamentary History and Review' for 1825-1826 it is stated that no reason can be assigned for the interference of the legislator in the protection of animals unless their protection be connected, either directly or remotely, with some advantage to man. The Bill for the abolition of bear-baiting and other cruel practices was expressly propounded on the ground that nothing was more conducive to crime than such sports, that they led the lower orders to gambling, that they educated them for thieves, that they gradually trained them up to bloodshed and murder. The criminal code. of the German Empire, again, imposes a fine upon any "who spitefully tortures or cruelly ill-treats beasts, person 'Cruelty to Animals,' in The Month and Catholic Review, xxv. 401 sqq.; Hedley, 'Dr. Mivart on Faith and Science,' in Dublin Review, ser. iii. vol. xviii. 418. 1 Clarke, in The Month and Catholic Review, xxv. 406. 2 Cobbe, Modern Rack, p. 6. 3 Kant, Metaphysische Anfangungsgründe der Tugendlehre, § 16 sq., pp. 106, 108. 4 E.g., Alexander, Moral Order and Progress, p. 281; Ritchie, Natural Hommel, quoted by von Hippel, 6 Lasson, op. cit. P. 548. von Hippel, op. cit. p. 125. Parliamentary History and Review, 1825-6, p. 761. 8 Ibid. p. 546. either publicly or in a manner to create scandal "1-in other words, he is punished, not because he puts the animal to pain, but because his conduct is offensive to his fellow men. Indifference to animal suffering has been a characteristic of public opinion in European countries up to quite modern times. Only a little more than a hundred years ago Thomas Young declared in his Essay on Humanity to Animals' that he was sensible of laying himself open to no small portion of ridicule in offering to the public a book on such a subject. Till the end of the eighteenth century and even later cock-fighting was a very general amusement among the English and Scotch, entering into the occupations of both the old and young. Travellers agreed with coachmen that they were to wait a night if there was a cock-fight in any town through which they passed. Schools had their cock-fights; on Shrove Tuesday every youth took to the village schoolroom a cock reared for his special use, and the schoolmaster presided at the conflict. Those who felt that the practice required some excuse found it in the idea that the race. was to suffer this annual barbarity by way of punishment for St. Peter's crime; but the number of people who had any scruples about the game cannot have been great considering that even such a strong advocate of humanity to animals as Lawrence had no decided antipathy to it." Other pastimes indulged in were dog-fighting, bull-baiting, and badger-baiting; and in the middle of the eighteenth century the bear-garden was described by Lord Kames as one of the chief entertainments of the English, though it was held in abhorrence by the French and " other polite nations," being too savage an amusement to be relished 1 Strafgesetzbuch, § 360 (13). 2 Young, Essay on Humanity to Animals, p. I. 3 Roberts, Social History of the People of the Southern Counties of England, p. 421 sqq. Rogers, Social Life in Scotland, ii. 340. In 1856, when Roberts wrote his book, cock penance was still paid in some English grammar schools to the master as a perquisite on Shrove Tuesday (Roberts, P. 423). Roberts, op. cit. p. 422. 5 Lawrence, Philosophical Practical Treatise on Horses, ii. 12. and by those of a refined taste.' As late as 1824 Sir Robert (then Mr.) Peel argued strongly against the legal prohibition of bull-baiting." About two years previously, however, humanity to animals had, for the first time, become a subject of English legislation by the Act which prevented cruel and improper treatment of cattle. This Act was afterwards followed by others which prohibited bear-baiting, cock-fighting, and similar pastimes, as also cruelty to domestic animals in general. In 1876 vivisection for medical or scientific purposes was subjected to a variety of restrictions, and since 1900 cases of ill-treatment of wild animals in captivity may be dealt with under the Wild Animals in Captivity Protection Act. On the Continent cruelty to animals was first prohibited by criminal law in Saxony, in 1838, and subsequently in most other European states. But in the South of Europe there are still countries in which the law is entirely silent on the subject." Whatever be the professed motives of legislators for preventing cruelty to animals, there can be no doubt that the laws against it are chiefly due to a keener and more generally felt sympathy with their sufferings. The actual feelings of men have commonly been somewhat more tender than the theories of law, philosophy, and religion. The anthropocentric exclusiveness of Christianity was from ancient times to some extent counterbalanced by popular sentiments and beliefs. In the folk-tales of Europe man is not placed in an isolated and unique position in the universe. He lives in intimate and friendly intercourse with the animals round him, attributes to them human qualities, and regards them with mercy.7 Tender feelings towards the brute creation are also displayed in many legends of saints. St. Francis of Assisi talked |