Animal cruelty

“ There are also, in addition, many other acts that impose certain liabilities in respect of animals and indirectly prevent cruelty. The Cruelty to Animals Acts 1849 and 1854 render liable to prosecution and fine practically any act of cruelty to an animal; such acts as dubbing a cock, cropping the ears of a dog or dishorning cattle, are offences. ”

“ One with a strong stomach and a hard head may be able to tolerate much of the unconscious and undeliberate cruelty and torture of the world that is perpetrated in hot blood and stupidity. I have such a stomach and head. But what turns my head and makes my gorge rise, is the cold-blooded, conscious, deliberate cruelty and torment that is manifest behind ninety- nine of every hundred trained-animal turns. Cruelty, as a fine art, has attained its perfect flower in the trained-animal world. ”

“ I tell you these things, my children, not to lessen in your eyes the undeniable superiority of man, but to inspire in you a fellow feeling for animals that are formed like us, suffer as we do, and are far too often the victims of our stupid cruelty. Whoever needlessly causes an animal to suffer commits a barbarous act, an inhuman act, inasmuch as he inflicts torture on flesh like our own ”

“ Every animal killed knows the one who takes its life, but it is helpless, yet it resists, but cannot escape the death blow; realizing the cruelty, and wrong, that makes every nerve cry out in remontrance, and its blood curdles and boils in its veins with fear and dread of what is coming; and this condition produces a high state of fever that poisons every atom of its flesh; and when eaten it causes disease that brings death to the eater, sooner or later." J. H. Neff.
"CIVILIZED CANNIBALS."
Murdering is the business of the people! ”

“ This is, after all, exactly the way in which the Yezdi Mussulman treats the human being whom he considers unclean. He has alternative principles which he chooses according to his mood and circumstances. Sometimes the prejudice against killing animals gives rise to very great cruelty. It is generally considered a sin to kill an animal except in self defence or for food, but you may do anything to it short of extinguishing life with your own hand. ”

“ SLAUGHTERING ANIMALS. In killing animals for food all painful processes are avoided. Under the old system the cruelty with which the animal was treated, and its suffering from the violence of the death-struggle greatly affected the quality of the meat, lessened its nutritive powers, and rendered it less digestible, and very often exciting and injurious. Now, when an animal is to be killed, it is placed in a large lighted stable, over which is a loft, communicating with it by means of a grating. ”

“ There is a species of cruelty to animals, happily, I believe, very rare. I refer to that which induces a person to treat harshly and unkindly some dumb creature for the simple reason that it belongs to an enemy. Whatever of harm an animal’s master may have done me, it, at all events, is guiltless of evil. ”

“ The training of wild animals may, or may not, involve cruelties, according to the intelligence and the moral status of the trainer. This is equally true of the training of children, and the treatment of wives and husbands. A reasonable blow with a whip to a mean and refractory animal in captivity is not necessarily an act of cruelty. Every such act must be judged according to the evidence. ”

“ For they count hunting the lowest, the vilest, and most abject part of butchery; and the other parts of it more profitable and more honest as bringing much more commodity, in that they (the butchers) kill their victims from necessity, whereas the hunter seeks nothing but pleasure of the seely [simple, innocent] and woful animal’s slaughter and murder. The which pleasure in beholding death, they say, doth rise in wild beasts, either of a cruel affection of mind or else by being changed, in continuance of time, into cruelty by long use of so cruel a pleasure. ”

“ To thus destroy the animal may appear heartless, but, in reality, is an act of mercy; as it is much better for him to die a quick, painless death, than to be sold to a life of toil, pain, and cruelty, in which, perhaps, he may pass mouths, if not years, of a living death. ”

“ This infusion is also used in our houses, and during repasts; couches, bedding, and coverings are sprinkled with the liquid. A preparation is also used for the toilette, in order to protect the head and face from the flies.
CRUELTY TO ANIMALS. Cruelty to an animal, even when not intended for food, entails so much disgrace that it is an offence of the rarest occurrence. My laws provide various punishments according to the grade of the offender and the nature of the offence.
If a common man were really cruel to his horse he would be compelled to draw his merchandise by hand. ”

“ And it cannot be denied, hide it how we may, either from our eyes or our conscience, that however skilfully the actual killing may usually be carried out, there is much unavoidable suffering caused to the beasts that have to be transported by sea and rail to the slaughter-house. The animals suffer violently from sea-sickness, and horrible cruelty (such as pouring boiling oil into their ears, and stuffing their ears with hay which is then set on fire, tail-twisting, etc.,) has to be practised to prevent them lying down lest they be trampled on by other beasts and killed ”

“ They also maintain that in no system of faith is cruelty to innoxious animals sanctioned: and all human sanction for such acts proceeds from their attending to the apparent import of words, without having recourse to profound or earnest consideration—for example, by putting a horse or cow to death is meant, the removal or banishing from one’s Pg 66 self animal propensities, and not the slaughtering or devouring of innoxious creatures. ”

“ Animals were formerly sacrificed with some decorum to the plea of necessity, but are now with unceremonious brutality destroyed, to gratify the unfeeling pride or wanton cruelty of men. Broad barefaced butchery occupies every walk of life; every element is ransacked for victims ”

“ What has here happened is that the instinct of cruelty, which has turned inwards, has become self-torture, and all man's animal instincts have been reinterpreted as guilt towards God. Every Nay man utters to his nature, to his real being, he flings out as a Yea, an affirmation of reality applied to God's sanctity, his capacity of judge and executioner, and in the next place to eternity, the "Beyond," pain without end, eternal punishment in hell. ”

“ I think they give rise to the utmost cruelty to the creatures hunted and shot, to the horses and dogs employed; and to witness torture inflicted on unoffending animals cannot but have a debasing effect on the human mind. ”

“ We will not dwell upon the cruelty to animals, upon the sights to be witnessed in every market-town, such as tortured calves and half suffocated pigs, because cruelty is everywhere, and we as strangers are helpless in a land where it is not considered a sin to inflict suffering upon animals. ”

“ In its circumstances, the killing of animals may be sinful, and even gravely sinful, as when one kills the animals of one’s neighbor (Exod, xxii. 10, 11) , or hunts against the law, or injures society by prodigal destruction of animal or plant life, or kills animals in cruel ways. The skinning of animals alive, in order to secure finer-looking furs to satisfy the vanity of women, is an inhuman barbarism of the worst type that should be reprobated by everybody. ”

“ Such old phrases as "the merciful man is merciful to his beast" indicate that cruelty to the domesticated creatures was, in a way, reprobated by the ancients; but not until well on in the present century do we find any indication that reason had come to the help of pity in an effort to frame rules having the weight of law and the support of sanctions, either those of public opinion or the more direct penalties of the courts, to limit the conduct of men towards the lower animals. ”

“ I might doubtless give other instances of well-known men who were lovers of dogs, [230a] but I shall refrain from further quotation. The instincts of man are being purged of the brutality by which they are too often characterised, and what are clumsily called dumb animals have benefited side by side with human beings. It is not yet true that even a merciful man is merciful to his beast, but in England, at any rate, it is recognised that actual cruelty to animals is wrong, but even this is not always the case among other nations. ”

“ Fast trust upon the hands which murder them.”
If the cruelty and injustice to animals are nothing to us, we have still another argument to offer—the brutalization of the men who slaughter that we may eat flesh. ”

“ Dogs, again, that had been quite law-abiding as regards domestic poultry, tame rabbits, sucking pigs, or sheep and lambs, suddenly took to breaking beyond the control of their masters, and killing anything that they were told not to touch. It was held that any animal killed by a dog had died a natural death, for it was the dog’s nature to kill things, and he had only refrained from molesting farmyard creatures hitherto because his nature had been tampered with. ”

“ Of course, now, and for a long time to come, the ignorant, the lowly organized, and the depraved will maltreat animals; and they must be appealed to in a way that is deterrent—that is, by punishment. But the sooner we can establish a strong and correct public feeling on the subject of the rights and relations of animals, the more effectually will cruelty be prevented ”

“ No country, with the least claim to civilization, should allow such things, and our descendants will be astonished that people calling themselves civilized should have indulged in such wholesale and gratuitous atrocities. When people allow animals to be murdered—for it is nothing but murder—for the sake of sport, they ought not to be surprised that men are murdered by criminals for reasons which seem to them good and sufficient. An animal has as much right to its life as man has to his. ”

“ What becomes of the poor little defenseless things? In nine cases out of ten they live a hunted, miserable life, crying from hunger, shivering with cold, harassed by cruel dogs, and tortured to make sport for brutal boys. How much kinder and more really humane to take upon ourselves the momentary suffering of causing the death of an animal than to turn our backs and leave it to drag out a life of torture and misery! ”

“ Cruelty, cruelty, cruelty—all is cruelty! Boys are beaten; oxen are stabbed till the blood bursts forth; happy, industrious, dung-collecting beetles are bitten in two by careless, happy, beetle-collecting dogs—everything is wicked and cruel. ”

“ Having no wish to dwell on what is morbid and unpleasant, I shall not pain the feelings of my readers by harping on the sufferings which their victims undergo, but shall content myself with remarking that those good people are mistaken who imagine that the slaughter of animals is painless and merciful. A society has lately been instituted (not by Vegetarians) with the object of introducing into our slaughter-houses more humane and sanitary methods of procedure. The mere existence of such a society is a proof that the system is not free from cruelty ”

“ I answer, it is cruelty to kill a snake or a toad in cold blood, but the poison of their nature makes it a charity to our neighbours to destroy those creatures, not for any personal injury received, but for prevention; not for the evil they have done, but the evil they may do.
Serpents, toads, vipers, &c., are noxious to the body, and poison the sensitive life; these poison the soul, corrupt our posterity, ensnare our children, destroy the vitals of our happiness, our future felicity, and contaminate the whole mass. ”

“ The church folk encourage the killing of quadruped, fish and fowl and then have the audacity to say grace at meal time, thanking God and imploring Him to shower blessings upon them.
You believe in all that elevates man to the highest standard of excellence and yet in the eating of a slaughtered animal you are an accessory to the crime of murder—a crime that is far more morally wrong and horrible than any so-called venial sin. ”

“ The cruelty-to-animals bill, now under consideration in the British Parliament, provides that vivisection should only be performed with a view to the advancement of human knowledge, the prolongation of human life, or the alleviation of human suffering ”

“ Yet if it be true that the sentiment of compassion is imperceptibly weakened by the sight and practice of domestic cruelty, we may observe that the horrid objects which are disguised by the arts of European refinement are exhibited in their naked and most disgusting simplicity in the tent of a Tartar shepherd. The Oxen or the Sheep are slaughtered by the same hand from which they were accustomed to receive their daily food, and the bleeding limbs are served, with very little preparation, on the table of their unfeeling murderers. ”

“ E. Bell has written, “Dreadful are the revelations made by humane men, who, setting aside personal comfort and peace of mind, have endeavoured to sound the depths of animal agony and bloodshed. The process of flaying alive, and even of dismembering animals before the breath has left their bodies, is far from uncommon in private slaughter-houses.” ”

“ Not to kill any animal, seems to me an excess of a good thing. The vermin that infest our houses and gardens must be destroyed, and children must see them destroyed. But it should always be done with expressed regret, and as mercifully as possible. The explanation that we kill them to prevent the evil they would do, is very good, and very satisfactory. But the fact is, there are very few creatures in this climate which do us harm; more than half our aversions to animals are mere prejudices. ”