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THE TREATMENT
OF ANIMALS1
BY JOHNPASSMORE
One restrictionon the absolutism
of
man's rule over Nature
is now
generally
accepted:
moral
philosophers
nd
public
opinion
agree
that
it
is
morally mpermissible
o be cruel
to
animals.
And
by
this
they
mean
not
only
that
it is
wrong
to
enjoy torturing
animals-which
few
moralists
would
ever have
wished
explicitly
o
deny,
however ittle
em-
phasis they
might
have
placed
on
cruelty
to animals
in
their
moral
teaching-but that it
is
wrongto cause them to sufferunnecessarily.
"The
Puritan,"
Macaulay
once
wrote
with
condemnatory
intent,
"hated
bear-baiting,
ot because
t
gave
pain
to
the
bear,
but because
t
gave
pleasure
to the
spectators."2
n other
words,
what
they
hated-
and
by
no means
perversely-was
the
enjoyment
of animal
suffering;
o
the
mere fact that the bears
sufferedas
a
consequence
f humanaction
they
were
ndifferent.
That,
on the
whole,
s
the
Christian radition.
But
now the situation has
changed;
not
only cruelty-the
enjoyment
of
animalsuffering-but callousness, ndifferenceo animalsuffering,not
taking
it
into account
in
deciding
how
one
ought
to
act,
is
morally
condemned.3
Controversies
no
doubt
remain.
But
they
now
turn around he
ques-
tion what
is
to
count
as
"making
animals
suffer
unnecessarily,"
whether,
for
example,
vivisection
or
fox-hunting
are,
in these
terms,
morally
ustifiable.By looking
in
some
detail at
the
way
in
which the
general
moral
principle
hat
it is
wrong
to
act
callously
has
gradually
won acceptance,we can hope to see revealed,first, how reluctantly
Western
man has
acceptedany
restrictionwhatsoever
on
his
supposed
right
to deal as
he
pleases
with
Nature
and,
secondly,
how
changes
n
his
moral
outlook
have
nevertheless ome
about.
The Old
Testament did
not
leave
men
totally
without
guidance
n
their treatment
of animals.
The Hebrews
were
told,
for
example,
not to
"seethe
a kid
in his
mother's
milk"
and
not
to "muzzle
he ox when
he
treadeth out
the corn."4
But
these
somewhat outre
prohibitions,
as
lAn occasional sentence in this paper also appears in my Man's Responsibility for
Nature
(London,
1974).
2Thomas
Macaulay,
History of
England
(London,
1850),
I,
ch.
2,
161.
3The distinction
between
cruelty
and
callousness,
here
suggested,
does not conform
to
ordinary
usage
which includes
under the head
of
"cruelty"
both indifference
to and
enjoyment
of
suffering.
In the
argument
that
follows,
this
usage
will
sometimes be
adopted.
But
at
other
points
it
leads
to
the
confusion
of
issues,
and I shall have to
dis-
tinguish,
as
I
have
just
done,
between
enjoyment
(cruelty)
and
indifference
(callous-
ness).
4Exodus
23:19;Deuteronomy
25:4.
195
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196
JOHN
PASSMORE
Maimonides and
Aquinas
suspected
and modern
scholarship
has
confirmed,
weredirected
against
heathen
magical
practices
rather
han
againstcrueltyor callousnessas such.5As for the other familiarOld
Testament
prohibitions,
hey
sometimes
rest
on the fact
that
asses and
oxen
were a valuable
orm
of
property, ust
as
when
Luke
reports
Jesus
as
asking
he Jews "Which
of
you
shall
have an assor an
ox fallen
nto a
pit,
and
will not
straightway
ull
him out on the Sabbath
day?"
he
is
not
suggesting
hat
they
will
break
the Sabbath
o relieveanimal
suffering,
but that
they
willdo
so to retrieve heir
property.6
n other cases
they
reflect
a
superstitious
ear
of
shedding
blood. So one
must not
exag-
gerate, as some interpretershave been temptedto do, the degreeto
which
the Old
Testament condemns
callousness.
Its
total
effect,
however,
is
certainly
not one of
complete
indifference
to
animal
suffering.
Paul, however,
refuses
o
interpret iterallyany
Biblical
precepts
re-
lating
to the
treatment
of
animals.
"Doth
God,"
he
rhetorically
asked,
"take care
of oxen?"When
men are
told not to muzzle
he mouthof the
ox, this,
Paul
is
confident,
s
meant
metaphorically,
s a
way
of
telling
men that "he thatplowethshouldplowin hope."7Nor does Paul stand
alone.
In
his
commentary
on Psalm
104,
Augustine
after
quoting
with
approval
Paul's
"Doth
God
take care
of
oxen?"carries
his
habit
of alle-
gorical
interpretation
o
far as
completely
to.disguise
he
character
of
that
psalm
as a
hymn
to God's
providentialgovernment
of
Nature.
("The
earth,"
for
example,
becomes
n
Augustine's
nterpretation,
the
Church.")8
The
precept
not to seethe
a kid in
its
mother's
milk
Augus-
tine understands
as a
prefiguring
f
Christ.9
In
short,
God,
as
under-
stood by Augustine,is quite unconcernedabout man's treatment of
Nature;
all God cares
about
s man's
relation
o
God
and
his
Church.
Augustine
was
particularly
concerned lest Christians
should be
tempted
by
the Manichaean
doctrine hat
it is
wrong
to
kill
and
eat ani-
mals.
He
had
been a Manichaean
himself
and knew
ts
attractions.
As
is so
often
true of
vegetarianism,
Manichaean
egetarianism
estedon a
complex
religioussystem.
The
divine
part
of
the
world,
so
the Man-
"Moses
Maimonides,
Guide
of
the
Perplexed
(Part
III,
ch.
48)
and the
commentary
by
David Bourke
and
Arthur
Littledale
to their
translation of
Aquinas,
Summa Theolo-
giae,
vol.
29,
The
Old
Law
(la
2ae,
98-105),
question
102,
article
6,
p.
225.
6Luke
14:5.
7I
Corinthians 9:10-11.
8Expositions
on the
Book
of
Psalms,
trans.
by
members
of the
English
Church
(Ox-
ford,
1853),
V,
85.
9Aurelii
Augustini
Opera,
Pars V:
Quaestiones
in
Heptateuchum,
Liber
Secundus,
Quaest.
Exodi, XC,
23,
19
in
Corpus
Christianorum,
XXXIII,
114-15
(Turnhout,
1958).
On the
whole theme of Christian
attitudes to
animals: Edward
Westermarck,
Christianity and Morals ch. XIX, and C. W. Hume, The Status of Animals in the
Christian
Religion (London,
1956).
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THE TREATMENT
OF
ANIMALS
197
ichaeans
taught,
was
constantlybeing
released
from the soil.
It
enters
thence
into
plants
in
virtue of the fact that
they
have
their roots in the
soil.10Animals eat the plants,butin the processdefilethe divine ngre-
dients
the
plants
contain-inevitably
so,
on Manichaean
principles,
since animalsare
born
as a result
of the
supremelydefiling
act
of
sexual
intercourse.
Holy
men,
spiritualizedby
prayer,
celibacy,
and
fasting,
can
extract
divinity
n its
pure
form from
plants
whereas even their
holiness
couldnot
abate
the
corruption
nherent
n animalbodies."
In
the course
of
attacking
the Manichaeans
Augustine
was led
to
make a
quite general
point
about
man's treatment
of animals.
"Christ
Himself,"he writes,"showsthat to refrain romthe killingof animals
and the
destroying
of
plants
is
the
height
of
superstition
or,
judging
that there
are
no
common
rights
between
us
and
the
beasts and
trees,
he
sent the devils
nto a
herd
of swineand
with
a cursewithered he tree
on whichhe foundno fruit."
"Surely,"
Augustine
continues,
"the swine
had
not
sinned,
nor had the tree."
Animals,
that
is,
have
no
rights.
Christ,
who
might
simply
have
destroyed
the
possessing
devils,
chose
rather to
transfer them
to swine
in
order
to make
that fact
perfectly
clearto men.At anotherpoint Augustine ells us that animalsuffering
means little
or
nothing
to human
beings.
"We can
perceive by
their
cries,"
he
writes,
"that animalsdie
in
pain, although
we
make little
of
this
since the
beast,
lacking
a rational
soul,
is not related
to us
by
a
common
nature."12 ince beasts
lack
reason,
that
is,
we
need
not con-
cern ourselves
with
their
sufferings.
And
this, too,
is
why
they
have no
rights.
The source of these
Augustinian
eachings
s
certainly
not
the Old
Testament,according o whichanimalsandmensharea commonprin-
ciple
of
life
(nebesh).
For the
author of
Ecclesiastes,
indeed,
"that
which befalleth the sons of men befalleth
beasts;
even
one
thing
be-
falleth
them;
as
the one
dieth,
so dieth the
other;
yea,
they
have
all
one
breadth;
so that a man hath no
preeminence
above a beast."13And
if
Ecclesiastes
s a hard nut for
orthodoxy
o
crack-it
is
nowhere
quoted
in
the
New
Testament-there
is
nothing
novel,
from
an Old
Testament
point
of
view,
in its
suggestion
hat man and beast
share "one
breath,"
?1This iew-that the soil
is
the
source of all
goodness-persists
in
European
and
American
thinking.
Jefferson
Notes
on the State
of
Virginia,
Query XIX)
was con-
vinced hat "thosewho labour
n
the earth
are the chosen
people
of God."Or
compare
P. W.
Foxburgh's
The Natural
Thing
New
York,
1953):
"The land
is
good,
in
fact
good
beyondquestion
and
t
is
good
to live on the
land
andwork
t"
(24).
The
goodness
of
virgin
oil is often
taken
for
granted,
with
disastrous
agricultural
onsequences.
"Augustine,
The
Catholicand
Manichaean
Waysof Life,
trans.
D. A.
Gallagher
and
I.
J.
Gallagher
Washington,
966),
ch.
XV,
91.
21Ibid.,
h.
XVII,
102and 105.
3Ecclesiastes
:19.
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198
JOHN
PASSMORE
one
soul,
one
principle
of
life.
In the
New
Testament,
too,
all
living
things
are
represented
s
possessing
a
psyche.14
We do
not
have
to
look
far
into Greek
philosophy,
however,
o
find
the
source
of
Augustine's
eachings.
TheStoics
thought
t obvious
hat
animals
were
devoid
of
reason.
They
were
as
confident
as
Paul
that
Providence
cared
nothing
for
animals,
except
as an indirect
way
of
caring
for
men.
And
like
Augustine,
they
were
ready
to
conclude
that
animals,
as
lacking
reason,
must
also lack
rights.15
From
the
society
of
rational
beings,"
so Pohlenz
sums
up
the
Stoic
position,
"animals
are
naturally
excluded."
"Against
the
Pythagoreans,"
he
goes
on
to
pointout, "theStoicsvigorouslydefended heviewthatthere
s no
legal
or moral
tie of
any
kind
between
man
and animal."16
Even
the
most
unorthodox
of
Stoics
stood
firm on
this
point,
during
the
long
five-
hundred
ear
history
of
the Stoic
school.
Not all Christians
were
convinced,
however,
by
the
Stoic
argument
that
since
the
beasts are
irrational,
men
may
treat
them
as
they
please.
"Even to
the
unreasoning
creatures,"
wrote
John
Chrysostom
n the
fourth
century,
"[the
saints]
extend
their
gentleness."17
lso
a
Greek-
the Italian Fathers absorbedsomething of the inhumanitycharac-
teristic of
Rome-Basil
the
Great
composed
a
prayer
for
animals:
"And for
these
also,
O
Lord,
the
humble
beasts,
who
bear
with
us
the
heat and
burdenof
the
day,
we
beg
thee to extend
thy
great
kindness
of
heart,
for thou
hast
promised
o save
both
man
and
beast,
and
great
is
thy loving-kindness,
O
Master."18
Note
that Basil
thinks of
God
as
having"promised
o
save both
man
and beast."
He
relies,
no
doubt,
on
Paul's
Epistle
to
the
Romans,
where
Paul tells
us
that "the
earnest
ex-
pectationof the creaturewaitethfor the manifestationof the sons of
God."
Paul's
phrase
"of
the
creature,"
particularly
when
t
is followed
by
the observation
hat
"the whole creation
groaneth
and
travaileth
n
pain
together
until
now,"
does
not
suggest
that
it is
only
human
beings
who are
waiting
on God.19
But,
although
Basil
is
by
no
means
the sole
exception,
his
passage
has
not
normally
been taken to
imply
that beast
as well as man
will be
saved,
as
distinct from
being
"transfigured."
That beasts are
incapable
of
immortality,
indeed,
is
often
taken to
follow fromtheverynatureof theirsouls.20
4W. E.
Lynch,
"Soul,"
in New Catholic
Encyclopedia
(New
York,
1967),
XIII,
449-50,
sums
up
the Biblical
situation.
15Cf.
E. V.
Arnold,
Roman
Stoicism
(London,
1911),
187,
205,
274.
16Max
Pohlenz,
Die
Stoa
(G6ttingen,
1948),
137.
17Homilies
of
St. John
Chrysostom
on
the
Epistle
of
St.
Paul
to
the
Romans,
trans.
by
members
of
the
English
Church
(Oxford,
1861),
Homily
XXIX,
471.
"8Quoted
A. W.
Moss,
Valiant
Crusade
(London,
1961),
5.
"9Romans,
8:19,
22.
Compare
Karl
Barth,
Church
Dogmatics,
III,
pt.
IV,
trans.
G. W. Bromiley andT. F. Torrance (Edinburgh, 1961).
20E.g.,
Charles
Journet,
The
Meaning of
Evil,
trans.
M.
Barry
(London,
1963),
142,
which
lays
it down
that
not even
God
can
bring
an
animal
back
to life.
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THE
TREATMENT OF
ANIMALS
199
In
the
popular
mediaeval
tradition,
as contrasted
with
official
theology,
there are
many legends
which
associate
saintliness and
martyrdom
with kindness o
animals:even
Jerome
has
his
lion,
to
say
nothing
of Androcles.
Vicious animals
in
that tradition
were
like
the
Gadarene
wine,
inhabited
by
demons.
They
might
be
brought
o trial
for their
misdeedsand
punished
by
the
extremest
of
penalties-a
form
of
distinction
which,
no
doubt,
they
would
willingly
have
foregone.
Domesticated
animals,
n
contrast,
were the
dwelling
places
of
angels.
The
merely
wild,
but not
the
vicious,
were
spiritually
uninhabited.
Saintliness
was
demonstrated
by
a
capacity
to drivethe demons out of
the
vicious-as
some
of the
biographers
of
Francis
of Assissi
report
that
he
tamed the
wolf
of Gobbio-and
ordinary
human
virtue
in
domesticating
wild
animals,
hus
making
of
them a
fit
residence or an-
gels.
Saint Francis
s,
of
course,
the
most
famous
example
of a Christian
Nature-lover,
alling
upon
birds
as his sisters in an Umbria still
not en-
tirely
Christianized ut of
Nature-worship.21
ut his
case
is
anything
but a clear one.
Biographies y English
animal-lovers,
ften Protestant,
naturallystress his fellowshipwith Nature; Roman Catholicbiogra-
phers,
n
contrast,
are intent
on
establishing
his
orthodoxy.22
hey
write
with
scorn of those
who
see
in
Francisa sentimental
nature-lover,
nly
by
an
accident
of
time
ineligible
or the
Presidency
f
the
Royal
Society
for
the Prevention
of
Cruelty
to Animals.
Nor
is
there
any
hope
of set-
tling
such
controversies
by
returning
o
primary
sources;
hose
sources
are
for
the
most
part
deliberately
designed
o
create
a
particular
mage
of Saint
Francis,
he
image varying
rom
chronicler
o
chronicler.
A fewfacts, however,seemto be relativelyuncontroversial.His at-
titude
to
Nature-as
given
expression,
or
example,
in his
Canticle
to
the
Sun-is
very
like
that
of the
psalmist.
When
he
"preaches
o
the
birds"
it
is to
exhort
them
to
glorify
God in
the same
spirit
as
the
psalmist
calls
upon
not
only
all
living things
but even "fire
and
hail;
snow
and
vapors;
stormy
wind
ulfilling
his word" o
praise
he
Lord,
or
as an
old
Englishhymn
informs
us,
in a somewhatunfortunate
meta-
phor,
that "even
the
worm
bends
his
knee
to God."
"My
sister
birds,"
Francis s saidto havepreached,"youowe much to God andyou must
always
and
in
everyplace give
praise
to
him."23
And
his chronicler
oes
on to draw a
moral
n which he birds
are
compared
o the friars
"who,
like the
birds,
owned
nothing
of their
own
in
the world
and
entrusted
21E.
M.
Almedigen,
Francis
of
Assisi
(London,
1967),
23.
22Esp.
Michael
de
la
Bedoyere,
Francis
(London, 1962).
23The Little
Flowers
of
St.
Francis,
and
other Franciscan
Writings,
trans.
S.
Hughes
(New
York,
1964),
78.
The
introduction
should
be read as
illustrating
how
difficult it is to decide what Saint Francis did and taught; also J. R. H. Moorman, The
Sources
for
the
Life
of
St.
Francis
of
Assisi
(Manchester, 1940),
in the 1966
reprint
with
a new
preface
by
Bishop
Moorman.
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200
JOHN
PASSMORE
their lives
only
to the
providence
f
God."
It
was, indeed,
o the
friars,
not
to
the
birds,
that Francis
was
preaching.
Anthony
of
Padua,
in a
similarspirit,was to "preach
o
fish" as a means
of
rebuking
eretics.
Only
once does the
question
of
callousness
arise
in the
biographies
of Saint Francis
written
by
his friendsor
near-contemporaries
ndthen
it does so rather
disconcertingly.
One
of
the
brethren,
aken
ill,
told
Saint Francis'
disciple,
Jonathan,
he
had a
longing
for
pig's
trotters.
"In
great
fervor
of
spirit,"
Jonathan
cut
a trotter
off
a
living
pig.
Saint
Francis rebuked
him,
but with
no
referencewhatsoever
o his
callous-
ness. He
urged
him,
only,
to
apologize
o
the owner
of
the
pig
for
having
damagedhisproperty.24
The
vogue
of
Saint Francis
is
a
modern
one;
he
was in no
sense
a
well-known aint
until
after
the
appearance
of Paul
Sabatier's
Life
in
1893.
For Sabatierhe was that
favorite
nineteenth-century
igure:
an
in-
dividual
n
revolt
against
an institution.
Subsequentapologists
have
found
him useful as a
living
demonstration
hat
Christianity
does not
necessarily
think of Nature
as
something
to be dominated.
But Saint
Francis
had,
in this
particularrespect,
no immediate nfluence.
And
as
thatstaunchhumanitarian, rancesCobbe,putsit:
It
is a
very
small
matter that a
Saint,
six hundred
years ago, sang
with
nightingales
and fed
wolves,
if the monks of
his own Orderand the
priests
of
the
Church
whichhas canonised
him,
never
warn
their
flocks that
to torment
God's
creatures is
even a venial
sin,
and
when
forced
to notice barbarous
cruelties
o
a
brute,
nvariably
eply
"Non
e
Cristiano,"
s if all claims
to
com-
passion
were
dismissed
by
that
consideration.25
In general terms, certainly, Christianity, ike Stoicism, has not
thought
of
man as
being
bound
by
moral considerations
n
his
dealings
with
animals.
When
n
1772
James
Grangerpreached
against
cruelty
o
animals
his
sermon,
he
tells
us,
"gave
almost universal
disgust
to
two
considerable
congregations."
"The
mention
of
horses
and
dogs,"
he
continues,
"was censured
as
a
prostitution
of the
dignity
of
the
pulpit."26
The characteristicRoman Catholic
teaching
on
man's treatment
of
animals derivesfrom Aquinas. Aquinasdraws a distinctionbetween
affections
of reason
and
affections
of
sentiment.
At
the level
of
reason,
he
says,
it is
a matter
of
indifference
ow
men
behave
owardsanimals.
For God has
given
men
complete
dominionover them.
In
the
words of
the
psalmist, praising
God:
"Thou
madest
him
to
have dominionover
24Lifeof
Brother
Jonathan,
Ch.
I,
in
The Little
Flowers,
186-87.
25Lifeof
Frances
Power
Cobbe,
by
Herself
(London,
1894),
II,
ch.
XVIII,
174-75.
2E.
S. Turner,All Heaven in a Rage (London, 1964), 72-73.
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THE TREATMENT
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the works
of
thy
hands;
hou hast
put
all
things
under
his
feet."27
This,
according
o
Aquinas,
s the
sense
in
which"St.
Paul
says
that God
has
no carefor oxen, since he does not judge a man on how he has acted
with
regard
o
oxen or
other animals."28
The
situation
at the level of the emotions
is rather different.
Ani-
mals can
feel
pain;
men can feel
pity
for their
pain.
And
the
man
who
often
feels
pity
for
suffering
animals
s
more
likely,
so
Aquinas
ells
us,
to
have
compassion
on
his
fellowman.
It
is in
the
light
of
this
fact,
he
argues,
that we
ought
to
interpret
what
is
often taken
to
be
the
most
unambiguous
Old
Testament moral exhortation
o
man
to care for
his
beasts: "a righteousmanregardeth he life of his beast: butthe tender
mercies of the wicked are cruel."2
Men,
on
Aquinas's
view,
are "of a
piece"; they
are
compassionate
both to
men
and to animals.
So
righteous
men
will in
fact treat
their
beasts
well. But
only
their com-
passion
or their
cruelty
to men
is
of
any
moral
consequence; hey
are
not
righteous
because
they
treat their beasts well. The
Jews,
Aquinas
goes
on
patronizingly
o
remark,
were
particularlygiven
to
cruelty.
God, therefore,
"exhorted
hem
in
pity
even to
animals,
by
forbidding
certainpracticessavoringof crueltyto them." The fact remainsthat
there is
nothing morally
objectionable
n
cruelty
to
animals,
as
such,
considered
n
isolation from
the
cruelty
to men
with which
it
is
em-
pirically
associated. And
"cruelty"
includes both
enjoyment
of
and
indifference o their
sufferings.
He sums
up
his
position
thus:
"If
any
passages
of
Holy Scripture
seem
to forbid
us to
be
cruel
to
brute
ani-
mals,
for
instance
to kill a bird
with its
young,
that
is
either
to remove
men's
thoughts
from
being
cruel
to
other
men,
or lest
throughbeing
cruelto animalsone becomes cruelto other humanbeings,or because
injury
of an animal eads to
the
temporal
hurt of
man,
eitherof
the doer
of
the
deed,
or of
another;
or because of some
signification...
."30
These conclusions are
supposed
to
follow from
the
fact
that rational
creatureshavethe
right
to
govern
rrationalnature.
This
interpretation
f the
moral
situationwas to have
a
long
life.
In
the
eighteenth
century
Hogarth's engravings
The
Stages of
Cruelty
produced
a considerable
ffect;
they
purported
o
show,
somewhat
n
the mannerof his now better-knownRake's Progress,how crueltyto
animals
develops
into
cruelty
to man.
In
his lectures
on
ethics,
Kant
used these
engravings
as
a text on
which o
hang
his
Aquinas-like
iews
about man's treatment
of Nature.
The Leibnizian
Baumgarten,
so
Kant tells
us,
had
maintained hat
we have dutiesboth
towardsanimals
27Psalms
8:6.
28Summa
Theologiae,
Vol.
29,
la
2ae
102, 6,
p.
225.
9Proverbs
12:10.
30Summa
contra gentiles, Bk. III, ch. CXIII.
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JOHN
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and towardsbeautiful
andscapes.31
his
Kantdenies.
Animals,
he
says,
"are
not
self-consciousand
are there
merely
as
a
meansto an
end,"
the
end
being
man. What
Baumgarten
hinks of as duties
to animalsare in
fact
"indirect
duties
towards
humanity."
n
so far as
the actionsof ani-
mals
are
analogous
o
human
actions,
e.g.,
in so far as
we
can
think of
an
animal,
ike a
servant,
as
doing
service o
us,
we
have
duties
relating
to
them.
But
this
is
only
because
"thus we cultivate he
corresponding
duties towards human
beings."
If,
for
example,
a man shoots a
dog,
although
t
has served
him
well,
because t
is
getting
old,
"he does not
fail in
his
duty
to the
dog,
for
the
dog
cannot
udge."
Nevertheless,
"his
act is inhumanand damagesin himself that humanitywhichit is his
duty
to show towards mankind."
Anyone
who
is cruel or callous
in
regard
to animal
suffering,
so Kant
suggests,
will
become
cruel
or
callous
n
his
dealings
with
mankind;
nversely,
"tender
eelings
owards
dumbanimals
develop
humane
eelings
owards
mankind."
In
his
last
published
work,
his
Metaphysics
of
Morals,
Kant in-
cludes
compassion
to
animals
among
a man's
duties to
himself
rather
than his
duties
to
others.
But even
if
Kant's modification
f his
original
viewmay bear witnessto a degreeof uneasiness, hegeneral ine of his
argument
is
unaffected.
"Intimately
opposed
to
man's
duty
to
himself,"
Kant
writes,
"is a
savage
and at
the same
time
cruel
treatmentof
that
part
of creationwhich
s
living,
hough
acking
reason
[animals]."
"For
thus,"
he
goes
on,
"is
compassion
for
their
suffering
dulled
n
man,
and
thereby
a natural
predisposition
ery
serviceable
o
morality
in
one's
relations
with
other
men
is weakenedand
gradually
obliterated."
Kant was
anything
but a
callous man:
he is
ready
o main-
tain that "physicalexperiments nvolving xcruciatingpainfor animals
and conducted
merely
for the sake
of
speculative
nquiry
when
the end
might
also be
achieved
without
such
experiments)
are
to
be ab-
horred."32
ut he
cannot see how
men
can be said
to
have a
duty
to
ani-
mals as
distinct from a
duty
relating
to or
concerning
animals;
he has
somehow
to
convert
it
either
into a
duty
to
other
men
or
a
duty
to
ourselves.
For
a rational
ethics,
as
distinct
from
religion,
here can
be,
on Kant's
view,
no such
thing
as a
duty
to
God-the
only
other
hypothesishe mighthaveentertained.)
The
generalizations
n which Kant's
argumentdepends
are more
8"Kant,
Lectures
on
Ethics,
trans.
L.
Infield
(London,
1930),
239-40.
I
have
not
been able to trace the
reference
in
Baumgarten.
In
his
lectures,
Kant
is
commenting,
for the most
part,
on
Baumgarten's
Ethica
Philosophica.
In
?398
of
that
work
Baumgarten lays
it
down that brutal men should be avoided.
But Kant's
reference
is
to
a much more
developed
view.
"Metaphysics of
Morals,
Pt.
II;
The
Metaphysical
Principles
of
Virtue
(1797),
Ele-
ments of
Ethics,
Pt.
I, ?17,
trans. J.
Ellington
and W. Wick
(Indianapolis,
1964),
106.
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THE TREATMENT
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than
dubious-tyrants
from Nero to
Himmler
have
been
notoriously
devotedto animals.
It is
a matter
of common
observation,
ndeed,
hat
kindness o animals s often substituted or kindness o humanbeings.
Whether
he inverse
also
holds,
whether hose who are
cruel to
animals
are also cruel
to human
beings
t is more
difficult
o
say.
There
s
cer-
tainly
no
difficulty,
at
least,
in
conceiving
a
situation
n
which
cruelty
to
man and
cruelty
to
animals are
completely
dissociated:Kant
would
have
us believe hat underthese circumstances
here would be
nothing
wrong
n
cruelty
o
animals.
Newman's
conclusionson
cruelty
to
animals-sufficiently
authori-
tative in the Roman Catholic Churchto be quoted at length in the
Catholic
Encyclopedia-belong
to
this
same Stoic tradition:
We
have
no duties owards
hebrute
reation;
here s
no
relation f
justice
between
hemandus. Of course
we
are
bound ot to
treat hem
ll,
for
cruelty
is
an
offence
gainst
hat
holy
Law
which
urMaker
aswritten n our
hearts,
and s
displeasing
o Him.
But
they
can claim
nothing
t our
hands;
ntoour
hands
they
are
absolutely
delivered.
We
may
use
them,
we
may destroy
them
at
our
pleasure,
not our
wanton
pleasure,
but still for our own
ends,
for our
own benefitor satisfaction,providedwe cangivea rationalaccountof whatwe
do.33
Men,
in
other
words,
can deal
with animalsas
they
like,
providedonly
that
they
have
a
good
reason
for
doing
so: the
suffering
f
animals
does
not count as a
countervailing
eason.
They
ought
not to
enjoy
mal-
treating
hem,
but indifference
o their
suffering-callousness-is
not
a
sin.
Although
t
wouldbe
wrong,
or
example,
o make
of
cruelty
to ani-
mals a
sport,
it is
morally
unimportant
f animals
suffer
ncidentally
o
our
sport. Bullfighting,
n this
view,
is therefore
permissible
and so is
coursing.
If
what Newmancalled
"wanton"
pleasure
n the
sufferings
f
animals
is
forbidden,
his is
only
as a
consequence
of the fact that
all
wanton
pleasures
are
morally mpermissible.
Behind his attitude
to animals ies a
theology,
a
theology bitterly
opposed
to
any
form of
naturalism,
determined
o insist that between
man and beast there
lies an absolute barrier.
(Consider
he
everyday
use
of
the words
"brutes,""beasts,"
and even
"animal.")
So,
asked
to
permit
the
setting
up
of a
Society
for the Prevention
f
Cruelty
o Ani-
mals,
Pope
Pius
IX
replied
hat "a
society
for such
a
purpose
could
not
be sanctioned
n
Rome."
The
principle
o which
his
reply appealed
was
the familiar
Stoic
one that "man owed
duties to
his
fellow
men;
but he
owed
no
duties
to the lower animals."34
33J.H.
Newman,
Sermons Preached
on Various
Occasions,
2nd
ed.
(London, 1858),
Sermon
VI,
106-07.
3"Lifeof Frances Power Cobbe, by
Herself
(London, 1894), II,
ch.
XVIII,
171-72.
Cardinal
Manning
was more
sympathetic:
man,
he
thought,
had
a
duty
to God
to be
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JOHN
PASSMORE
Neither
Aquinas
nor
Kant
nor
Newman
denied,however,
hat ani-
mals could suffer:Descartes
and Malebranche
houghtdifferently.
t
is
impossible, hey argued, o be cruel to animals,sinceanimalsareinca-
pable
of
feeling.They
lack
not
only-as
Aquinas
had
followedAristotle
in
arguing-a
rationalsoul but even that sensitive oul
whichboth Aris-
totle and
Aquinas
had allowed
them. To
suppose
that animals could
feel would
be to
suggest
that there could
be
pain
and
suffering
where
there has
been
no
sin.
For
animalsdid not eat
of the
ForbiddenTree.
"Being
nnocent,"
Malebranche
writes,
"if
they
were
capable
of
feeling,
the
effect would be that
under
the
government
of an
infinitely ust
and
all-powerfulGod an innocent creature would sufferpain, which is a
penalty,
and
the
punishment
of some
sin."3
The
only
possible
con-
clusion,
appearances
o the
contrary
notwithstanding,
s that animals
cannot
feel.
"They
eat without
pleasure,"
Malebranche herefore ells
us,
"they cry
without
sorrow...,
they
desire
nothing,
they
fear
nothing,
they
know
nothing."36
The
Stoic
Chrysippus,
t is
worth
noting,
had also
suggested
hat animalsdo not feel
but
only
"as
it
were"
feel.)37
What
we hear
as
a
cry
of
pain
s
of
no more
significance
han the
creaking of a machine. An organ, the CartesianRouhault argues,
makes more noise
when
I
play
it than
an animal
when
t cries
out,
yet
we
do not
ascribe
eelings
o the
organ.38
These
teachings,
it
should
be
observed,
were more
than
metaphysical
speculations.
They
had a direct effect
on seventeenth-
century
behavioras
manifested,
or
example,
n the
popularity
f
public
vivisections,
not
as
an
aid
to scientific
discovery
but
simply
as
a tech-
nical
display. "They
administered
beatings
to
dogs
with
perfect
indifference,"o La Fontaine,a contemporaryobserver, ells us, "and
made
fun of
those who
pitied
the creaturesas
if
they
had felt
pain....
They
nailed
poor
animals
up
on boards
by
their four
paws
to
vivisect
them and see the
circulationof
the
blood whichwas a
great
subject
of
conversation."39
kind to
the
animals
God had
created.
Nowadays,
indeed,
there is in
Great Britain
a
Catholic
Study
Circle for Animal
Welfare-with its
own
journal,
The
Ark,
founded
in
1932.
(Within
the
Anglo-American
Roman Catholic
Church, too,
there are Animal
Blessing Services.) Even more strikingly in the United States, what was once The Na-
tional Catholic
Society for
Animal
Welfare
has
significantly
renamed itself
Society
for
Animal
Rights,
although
this still
does not
go quite
as far as the
name of
the
parallel
In-
dian
Society,
Animal Citizens.
3Recherche
de
la
Verite,
IV,
XI, ?11,
in
Oeuvres
Completes,
ed. G.
Rodin-Lewis,
II,
104.
36Ibid., VI, II, VII,
394;
also
C.
A.
Sainte-Beuve,
Le Port
Royal,
3rd. ed.
(Paris,
1867),
Bk.
2,
ch.
16,
316-17.
37Pohlenz,
Die
Stoa,
147.
38Entretiens
ur
laphilosophie,
II,
157.
39Quoted(no source given) in Loren Eiseley, The Firmament of Time (New York,
1962).
28-29.
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205
The
theological
problem
Descartes and
Malebranche
professed
to
have solvedwas
quite
a
seriousone: to account
for
the
sufferings
f ani-
mals
on
the
supposition
hat the world s
governedby
a benevolentand
omnipotent
God.
Augustine
had
sought
to solve
it
by arguing
hat there
was a lesson for
men
n
animal
suffering.
He
condemned
hose
"carping
critics" who
"try
to
shake
the
faith
of those less
instructed
on
the
problem
of
pain
and
hardships
also
suffered
by
animals"-animals
which
had
not been
implicated
n
Adam's
fall. The
solution,
according
to
Augustine,
s
that
only through
heirobservation
f
animal
suffering,
suffering
which is
"a
conscious
struggle
against
disintegration
and
dissolution,"
an men be made
sufficiently
ware
hat animals
possess
a
longing
for
unity,
a
longing
he
tells
us,
whichcould
only
have been
im-
planted
n
them
by
"the
supreme,
sublime,
and
unspeakable
unity
of
their
Creator."40
Animal
suffering,
n
other
words,
is a
chapter
n the
book
of
nature.
Less
sophisticated
heologians
were more
ready
to
adopt
the
al-
ternative view
that animal
suffering
was after
all a
consequence
of
Adam's
sin;
that sin threw he entireuniverse
nto confusion-as
indeed
Paulseems to suggestwhenhewritesthat "thewholecreationgroaneth
and travaileth
n
pain
together
until now."41
But there
s
something
in-
gularly
repellent
n
the idea
of a God
who wouldcause
animals o suffer
either so that
theologians
could
supply
another
reason
for
believing
hat
animalsare his creationor because
Adam had
disobeyed
him. It was
in
many ways
a
theologically
easier
solution
to
suppose,
however
im-
plausibly,
hat animalsdo not
in fact suffer
at all.
Indeed,
a
contempo-
rary
Roman Catholic moral
philosopher,
Dom
Trethowan,
is
still
readyto suggestthat the apparent ufferingof, for example,cats can
only
be
explained
on the
supposition
hat "a cat
is so
arranged
hat
if
you
pull
ts
tail,
a
noise comes
from
the other end."42
One of his
co-religionists,Jacques
Maritain,
adopts,
however,
a
very
differentattitude.
He
specifically
rejects
the
Aquinas-Kant
view
that men
ought
not to be cruel
to
animals
only
because
"cruelty
towards animals
developsfeelings
and
habits of
insensitivity
r sadism
which vitiate one's
personality
and menace
others." This
is
in
spite
of
his agreeingwith Kant andtheStoics that animalsarenot moralagents
and
have,
in
consequence,
neither
duties
nor
rights.
Nonetheless,
he
says,
we have duties
toward
them;
for all
that,
they
have
no duties
toward
us. Animals are
"foreshadowings
f human
persons";
n virtue
of that
fact,
they
have a
foreshadowing,
lthoughonly
a
foreshadowing,
4?Augustine,
The Free
Choice
of
the Will
(Washington,
1968),
trans.
F. P. Russell in
The Fathers
of
the
Church,
LIX,
227.
4Romans
8:22.
42Trethowan,
An
Essay
in Christian
Philosophy,
41;
also 92.
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JOHN PASSMORE
of
rights.
Our
duties towards
them,
however,
are real.43Thisview has
behind
t, too,
a
long
if
very
broken
tradition.
The Romans carried
cruelty to animalsto new depthsof barbarity.Only very gradually,
indeed,
did
they
impose
limitationson
a
man's
treatmentof his children
or
a
citizen's
of
foreigners.
As
for
slaves,
the Christian
Emperor
Justin-
ian's
codification
of Roman Law
lays
it down that "slaves cannot
be
outraged
themselves"
although
a master can
be
outraged
through
his
slave.
Not
surprisingly
t takes a
very
similarview
aboutoxen.44
The
Greeks, however,
had
generally
opposed
cruelty
to
animals:
"do
not
be cruel
to animals" s said to
have been one of
three moral
preceptsof Eleusis,45 ndPlutarchwas no exception.Especially n his
early
writings,
he
attacks
that
sharp
contrastbetween
man and animals
which had been
typical
of the Stoics.
He sets out to
show,
relying
for
this
purpose
on a
long
series
of
popular
fables,
that animals
are
quite
capable
of
reasoning.46
f
considerably
more interest
s
his
attempt
to
cope
with a
somewhat
special,
and
very
relevant,
argument
which de-
rives,
he tells
us,
from Stoic sources. There
could be no such
thing
as
justice,
this
argument
runs,
if beasts
partake
of reason.
For
men are
then"necessarilyunjust f theydo not sparethem";yet if theydo, "life
becomes
impracticable
and
impossible."
In
short,
"we shall be
living
the
life of
beasts
once we
give up
the
use of beasts"-no civilized
pur-
suit,
no
"refinementof
living"
could survive.47
Civilized
man,
so the
Stoic
argument
concludes,
simply
cannot
afford
to
allow that animals
are
rational.
Plutarch
suggests
a
reply
to this line
of
argument,
a
reply
which
dates
back,
so he
tells
us,
to
Pythagoras.
There s no
injustice,
he
says,
in punishingand slayingsuch animals as are vicious,"anti-socialand
merely injurious."
Nor
is
there
any injustice
n
taming
those
animals
which end
themselvesto
domestication,
"making
hem our
helpers
n
the tasks for
which
they
are fitted
by
nature,"
trainingdogs
as sen-
tinels,
or
keeping
herds of
goats
and
sheep
to be milkedand shorn.
For
men, too,
are
punished
or
put
to death
if
they
are
viciousand
men, too,
are trained
for
particular
asks,
for which
they
are
by
nature suited.
Only
in two
respects
do men need
to
alter
their conduct
f
they
are
to
43Maritain,
Neuf
lecons sur les notions
premieres
de
la
philosophie
morale
(Paris,
1951),
as
trans.
in
Charles
Journet,
The
Meaning of
Evil,
trans. Michael
Barry
(London,
1963),
138-39. Journet
follows Maritain on this
point.
"Institutes
ofJustinian,
trans. J.
B.
Moyle,
5th ed.
(London,
1913),
169-70.
45So
Porphyry says, quoting
from
Mermippus,
citing
Xenocrates.
The
precepts
can
be traced
back,
he also
alleges,
to
Triptolemus
(On
Abstinence
IV,
22).
46Plutarch,
The
Cleverness
of
Animals
in
Moralia,
?961,
trans.
W.
Helmbold,
Loeb
Classical
Library,
335.
On Plutarch and other classical writers:
George
Boas,
"Theriophily,"Dictionary of the History of Ideas (1973), IV, 384-88.
47Ibid.,
?6,963-64,
p.
347.
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THE TREATMENT OF
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207
deal
justly
with animals:
hey
should
give up slaughtering
hem for the
table
and
they
should
give
up
those varieties
of
sport
which
involve
crueltyto, or the deathof, animals."ForI thinksportshouldbejoyful
and between
playmates
who are
merry
on both sides."48Thus
it is
possible
to
reconcile
being
just
to animals and
sustaining
civilization.
For
civilizationdoes
not
depend,
Plutarch s
confident,
either on the
eating
of
meat or
on
blood
sports.
(Later
n
life,
Plutarch
was
to
excuse
meat-eating
on the
ground
that it "has become
a sort of unnatural
second
nature," i.e.,
a fixed
custom
which it would
be
impossible
to
overthrow,
although
he still
thought
t
best to
do without
t.)49
Plutarch's arguments were taken over by the neo-Platonist
Porphyry.
Animals,
he
agrees
with
Plutarch,
"are
not
entirely
alienated
from our nature."
They participate
n
reason,
even
if to an inferior
degree.
It
is therefore
quite
wrong
to hunt or
to
eat
them,
or
at
least
it
is
wrong
for
such
men as
aspire
o
perfection
o do
so,
the
only
class of
man
in
whom
Porphyry
was interested.
But
Porphyry
went
even further
than Plutarch. "He who
does not confine harmless conduct
to men
alone,"
he
writes,
"but extends
it
to other
animals,
most
closely ap-
proachesto divinityand if it werepossible to extend it to plants, he
would
preserve
this
image
in
a
still
greaterdegree."50
A
typical
ascetic,
he was
quite
unimpressed y
the Stoic
argument
hat the refinements
f
civilization
depend
on our
dealing
autocratically
with
animals
and
plants.
So much
the
worse
for refinements
Like
Genesis,
Porphyry
tells us
that men
in their
perfected
state
would eat
nothing
but
the
fruits which
plants
bear
in
numbers
beyond
theirneed to
reproduce.
This
s
at
least
a
gastronomic
mprovement
n
the bill of farepermittedby theprophetsof SamuelButler'sErewhon.
They
restrictthe
diet
of the
righteous
o
rotting
fruit and
decaying
cab-
bage-leaves.)51
e
adopts
a rather different
approach
o the Stoic
ar-
gument
that
any
attempt
on
man's
part
to be
just
to
the
beasts would
reduce
him to their
evel.
Justice,
he
says,
is
"nothing
more
than
a
phi-
lanthropy";
t
consists
in
"abstaining
rom
injury
to
anything
which
is not
noxious":
that is
why
men
can
properly
eat
superfluous
ruit,
shear
sheep,
and take theirmilk.52
It is illuminatingo observe heusewhichhas beenmade n modern
times
of
Porphyrean
eaching.
In 1792
the
Platonist
Thomas
Taylor
published
a work
entitled
A
Vindication
f
the
Rights of
Brutes
which
48Ibid.,
?7,964-65,
pp.
353-55.
49De Tuenda
Sanitate
Praecepta,
XVIII,
in
Plutarch's
Moralia,
trans.
F. C.
Bab-
bitt, II,
265.
500n
Abstinence,
VI,
27.
I have followed
the translation
in
Westermarck.
"5Erewhon,ch. XXVII.
"5De
Abstinentia,
3, 26,
trans.
Thomas
Taylor
(1823),
127.
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THE
TREATMENT
OF ANIMALS
209
restrained
by
what
he
significantly
alls "the
cautious,
ealous
virtueof
justice."
The
same is
true,
he
argues,
of
their
dealings
with
uncivilized
peoplesandwithwomen;women andthebarbarians,ikeanimals, ack
sufficient
power
to
compel
men to
compromise
with
them.
The fact
remains that
"we should be bound
by
the laws of
humanity
to
give
gentle
usage
to these
creatures."55
But
it
was not
only
the
skeptics
who were
beginning
to think
differently
about man's
relationships
o the
animals.
Rather
surpris-
ingly,
Hume's teacher Hutcheson had been
prepared
o
suppose
that
animalswere
capable
of
virtue,
f
only
virtue
of
a
primitive
kind,
of
the
sort children analsopossess.56Othermoralphilosophers id notgo so
far
as
this in
their
criticism
of
the
Stoics,
but
even
such
Stoic-influenced
moralistsas
WilliamWollastonwere
prepared
o
grant
that men
ought
to take
the
happiness
of
animals nto account
when
hey
act
"in
propor-
tion to their
several
degrees
of
apprehension."57
nd
Wollaston's
fellow-rationalist,
ohn
Balguy,
while
rejecting
Hutcheson's
view
that
animals
are themselves
capable
of
virtue,
nonetheless
s
confident hat
"brutes,
as
they
are
capable
of
being
treated
by
us either
mercifully
or
cruelly,maybe theobjectseitherof virtueorvice."58
Poets and
novelists,
as well as
moral
philosophers,
id
something
o
prepare
he
way
for
a
new attitude o
animals,
as indeed o Nature as a
whole.
In
As
You
Like
It
not
only
"the
melancholy
acques"
but,
much
more
significantly
even
the
aristocratic exiles
display
an
unexpected
degree
of
sensibility
to
the
sufferings
of
a
woundeddeer.59Sterne's
somewhat mawkish
apostrophe
o
a
donkey
and
Cowper's
poem,
The
Task,
are well known
eighteenth-centuryxamples
of the
new
tendency.
The "sentimentalist"movement as a whole, like Romanticism ater,
encouraged
men to
reflect on
their
relations
to
animals
as well
as
to
their
fellowman.
ndeed,
t
sometimes
emphasized
he formerat the
ex-
pense
of the latter.
But these were
observations
in
passing,
straws
in the
wind,
or
perhaps
not even so
much,
the
personal
reactions
of
men
of
unusual
sensibility.
The
fact
remains,
as
we
have
already
een,
that the
preacher
John
Granger
aroused
hostility
and
ridiculewhenhe
preached
n
1772
againstcruelty
to animals.And as late as
1798,
Thomas
Young began
his
Essay
on
Humanity
to Animals
by
expressing
he fear that he had
exposed
himself
to
ridicule
by
writing
a book on such a
topic.
Yet
55Enquiryconcerning
the
Principles of
Morals,
Sect.
III,
Pt.
I;
ed.
Selby-Bigge,
?145,
152.
"5Francis
Hutcheson,
An
Inquiry
into
the
Original of
our Ideas
of Beauty
and
Virtue,
Treatise
11,
4th
edition
London,
1738),
Section
7,
?3.
57Wollaston,
he
Religionof
NatureDelineated
London,
1724),
Section
2,
?10.
58Balguy,The Foundation of Moral Goodness (London, 1728), Pt. I, ?3.
5eAs
You Like
It,
Act
II,
Sc.
I.
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210
JOHNPASSMORE
Henry
Primatt
had
already,
n
1776,
published
his
Dissertation
on the
Duty
of
Mercy
and Sin
of Cruelty
to
Animals
and
the
century
that
followed was to witnessa long series of books on man's treatmentof
the animals.
Both Primatt
and
Young,
it will be
observed,
plead
for
"humanity"
o
animals;
Primattdescribes
mercy
as a
duty
and
cruelty
as a sin.
The belief
still
widely
prevailed,
t must
be
remembered,
hat
large
segments
of
mankind
were,
as Aristotle had
maintained,
born to be
slaves.60"From
the
hour
of
their
birth,
some
are
markedout
for
sub-
jection,
others for
rule....
Some men are
by
nature
free,
and others
slaves, and ... for these latter slavery is both expedient and right."
From our
present point
of
view,
significantly,
Aristotle
compared
he
natural
slave to tame animals
which,
he was
convinced
"have
a
better
nature
than
wild."
Not
until
1792did
Wilberforce
persuade
he British
House of Commonsto
agree
to the
gradual
abolition
of the slave
trade;
not until
1811 was
slave-trading
a
felony.
In
America
Delaware
abolished
slavery
as
early
as
1776,
but
it was
not
abolished in the
United States
as
a whole until 1865.
And
in
the widerworld
t
lingered
on, perhapsstill lingerson, well into the twentiethcentury.Not only
slaves
but
primitivepeoples,
too,
were
commonly thought
of as
lying
beyond
the bounds
of
morality,
as
Calibans.
As
late
as
the
mid-nine-
teenth
century,
the
aboriginal
inhabitants of Tasmania were de-
liberately
wiped
out.
So
long
as callousness towards
the
sufferings
of slaves
and abo-
rigines
was
not
morally
condemned,
t was
unlikely
that
callousness
towards
animalswouldbe
seriouslyregarded.
ndeed
o
insist
on
men's
moral responsibilityowardsslaves and barbarianst was sometimes
thoughtnecessary,
as it was
by
Herder,
to draw
a
sharp
distinctionbe-
tween the treatment
proper
to
man and
the
treatment
even
of
such
higher
animals
as
apes.
"O
man,
honor
thyself,"
Herder
writes,
"neither he
pongo
nor
the
gibbon
s
thy
brother;
he American
and the
Negro
are;
these
therefore hou
shouldnot
oppress,
or
murder,
or
steal
from;
for
they
are men like
thee;
with
the
ape
thou
canst
not enter
into
fraternity."61
lsewhere,
however,
Herderdraws attention
o the close
relationshipbetween men and, at least, domesticatedbeasts. "It is
generally
known,"
he
writes,
"that all animals
subservient
o the
pur-
poses
of
man
are more
useful,
in
proportion
o the
humanity
of
the
treatment
they
receive."62
Note
that
it
is
the
usefulness of kindness
6?Politics
1.5,
1254a-1255a,
rans.
B. Jowett
in
The
Works
of
Aristotle,
ed. W. D.
Ross,
Vol.
X
(Oxford,
1921).
"'Herder,
Reflections
Ideen),
Pt.
I,
Bk.
7,
ch.
1,
trans. T.
O.
Churchill
London,
1800).Bya "pongo" he translatorprobably,f wrongly,meantanorangutan.
62lbid.,
Bk.
8,
ch. 3.
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THE
TREATMENT
OF ANIMALS
211
which
is
here
emphasized:
here is
no
suggestion
that
animals have
rights. Nineteenth-century
writers,
in
contrast,
tended to
emphasize
not so
much
the
inhumanity
f
slavery
or
cruelty
as
the
violence
t
does
to
rights-the
typical
reactions
of a
politically-conscious
ge.
As
so
often,
the Benthamites ould
oin
handswith
the
evangelicals.
"The French have
already
discovered,"
Bentham
wrote,
"that
the
blackness
of the skin is no
reason
why
a
human
being
should be
abandoned
withoutredressto
the
caprice
of a
tormentor.
It
may
come
one
day
to be
recognised
hat
the
numberof
legs
... or the termination
of
the
os
sacrum
are
reasons
equally
insufficient
or
abandoning
a
sensitivebeingto the sameplight."63Observe he transition romslave
to animal. Bentham'sUtilitarianism ooks not to the
rationality
of the
agent
or
the
patient,
n
the
Stoic
manner,
but to
the
effect
of
the
agent's
actions on
all sentient
beings,
who are from this
point
of
view
to
be ac-
counted
equal.
If
all
pain
is
evil,
as
Bentham
hought,
then the
pain
of
animals-assuming
only
that
they
can feel
pain-ought
not
to
be
ignored
n man's moral
decisions.
The
pains
of animals
might
be
less,
as
not
including
he
pains
of
anticipation,
han
the
pains
felt
by
man,
but
that is no reason for not takingthem into account."Thequestion s
not,"
so
Bentham
argues,
"Can
they
reason?"
nor
"Can
they
talk?"
but "Can
they
suffer?"
So
whereasPlutarch and
Porphyry hought
t
necessary
to
begin
their case
against treating
animals
merely
as chat-
tels
by
arguing
hat
animalshave a share
n
reason,
for
Bentham
t
is
ir-
relevant
whether or not
they
are
rational and to what
degree.
It is
enough
hat
they
are
capable
of
suffering.
In
his
later
writings,
however,
Benthamreverted
o
something
more
like the Aquinas-Kantposition. The Traites edited by Dumont
condemn
cruelty
to animals
only-if
Dumont
can
be trusted-on
the
ground
that
it can
give
rise
to
indifference
o
human
suffering.
n his
Constitutional
Code,
Bentham's
mphasis
s
not on
suffering
but
on
the
alleged
act,
made
secondary
n
the
Principles,
hat mature
quadrupeds
are more moral
and more
intelligent
han
young
bipeds.
I
do not know
why
Bentham
changed
his
mind.
But
perhaps
he
boggled,
and
not
un-
naturally,
at the conclusion
hat to determinewhether
an
act
is
right
we
ought to take into consideration ts consequencesfor every sentient
being.64
The
evangelical-Benthamite
rusadehas
been
largely
successful.
In
Great Britain
he
law has
extended ts
protection
irst
(1822)
to horses
63lntroduction
to
the
Principles of
Morals
and
Legislation,
written
1780,
published
1789,
ed.
J.
H.
Burns and
H. L.
A. Hart
(London,
1970),
ch.
XVII,
?IV,
note b.
In
some
other editions the
chapter
number is XIX.
64For
details
of the
change:
David
Baumgardt,
Bentham and
the Ethics
of
Today
(Princeton,
1952),
338,
362.
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212 JOHN PASSMORE
and
cattle,
excepting
only
bulls,
and
eventually,
although slowly,
to
other animals.65
t is
sometimes
argued-as by
H.
S. Salt
in
his
Animal'sRights(1892)-that this is all thatis needed o show that ani-
mals have
rights:
o
say
that
they
have
rights
s
just
to
say
that
they
are
protected by
law.
Yet trees
may
also be
protected
by
law,
as
in
Na-
tional
Parks;
t
would be
very
odd to conclude hat
they
have
rights.
If
we think
of
a
"right"
as
a
demand
which,
f
it
is
made,
s
backed
by
law
or common
practice,
then animals
have no
rights;
hey
make no claims.
Nor
(in
this
respect
they
are
unlike
nfants)
can someoneelse
demand,
let
us
say,
free
pasturage
for
the rest of its life as
compensation
or
damagesincurred n an accident. Its owner,no doubt, can claim for
damages
in
such a
case,
but he does
not
hold the
damages
n
trust
for
the
horse;
he
is, indeed,
at
perfect
iberty
o shoot
it.
What has
happened
over the
last
century
and a half in the West is
not that
animals have been
given
more
power,
more
freedom,
or
anything
else which
might
be accountedas
a
right.
Rather,
men have
lost
rights:
hey
no
longer
have the same
power
over
animals,
they
can
no
longer
treat them as
they
choose.
This is characteristicof a
moral
change; t followsfrom the fact that, in Hart'swords,"moralrules m-
pose
obligations
and withdrawcertain
areas of conduct from
the
free
option
of
the
individual o do
as he likes."66
But
that men have lost
rights
over them
does
nothing
o convertanimals nto bearersof
rights,
any
more than we
give
rights
to
a river
by
withdrawing
omebody's
right
o
pollute
t.
Disputing
Salt's
conclusions,
D. G. Ritchie has
argued,
n
my
view
correctly,
that animals
cannot have
rights,
"not
being
members of
human society."67We sometimes now meet with the suggestion,
however,
that animals
do
in
fact
form,
with
men,
a
single
community.
Indeed,
the American
ecologist,
Aldo
Leopold,
has
gone
furtherthan
this:
"When
we see land as a
community
o
which
we
belong,
we
may
begin
to
use
it with love and
respect."68
As
a final
absurdity,
t is
worth
noting,
Thomas
Taylor's
Vindication
of
the
Rights of
Beasts
had
looked forwardto
a time when "even the
most
contemptible
clod
of
earth"
would
be
thought
of
as
having
rights.
He was better
as
a
prophet
than as anironist.)
Ecologically,
no
doubt,
men form a
community
with
plants,
ani-
mals, soil,
in the sense that a
particular ife-cycle
may
involve
two,
three,
or even
all four of them.
From the
point
of view of a
virus-if I
may
be
permitted
his
way
of
talking-men
are
hosts
in
which
hey
can
65Fordetails of
this crusade:
E.
S.
Turner,
Heaven
in
a
Rage
(London,
1964).
66H.
L.
A.
Hart,
The
Concept of
Law
(Oxford,
1961),
7.
67D.
G.
Ritchie,
Natural
Rights (London, 1894),
107.
68Leopold,
A
Sand
County
Almanac
(New
York,
1970),
Foreword,
xviii.
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THE
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OF
ANIMALS
213
develop,
hosts
which,
regrettably,
ometimesdie before
the virus
has a
chance to
pass
on to other hosts. But if it is
essential to a
community
that the membersof it have common interestsand recognizemutual
obligations
then
men,
plants,
animals,
and
soil
do not form a com-
munity.
Viruses and men do
not
recognize
mutual
obligations,
nor
do
they
have common interests.
In
the
only
sense
in
which
belonging
o
a
community
generates
ethical
obligation, hey
do not
belong
o
the same
community.
And it
can
only
create confusion o
suppose
that
they
do,
or
ought
to.
Spinoza
was
right
n
saying
that
"excepting
man
we
do
not
know
of
anything n nature in whose mind we can take pleasure,or anything
with whichwe can unite
ourselves
by way
of
friendship."
A
dog
cannot
be "a
man's best friend"
unless this is
just
a
way
of
saying
hat the man
has no friends.At
best,
to
adopt
Maritain's
phrase,
his relation
with
the
dog
is
a
"fore-shadowing"
f
friendship.
A
man
can,
of
course,
take
pleasure
n
a
dog's feelings,
he can be
pleased
hat his
dog
is
happy,
and
he
can take
pleasure,
oo,
in his
dog's
intelligence.
But
he cannot "share
his mind"
with
the
dog,
if
only
because
he
dog,
unlike
man,
has
no
con-
cern for thefuture.It doesnot follow,as Spinozaalso thought,that we
are
free to
destroy
everything
xcept
human
beings
"or
to
adapt
it to
our
service
n
any way
whatever,"
hat to have
scruples
on this
point
is
a
sign
of
"empty superstition
and womanish tenderness."69
here
is
nothing
"womanish"
or
"superstitious"
about
condemning ruelty
to
animals,
even if it
is
not difficult o
think of attitudes o animals
which
are both
"womanish" n their
coddling
and
"superstitious"
n
that
they
try
to
treat a
dog
as
if,
let
us
say,
it
were
a
person
n a
poodle's
skin.
At the same time, the reference o dogs remindsus that domesti-
cated animals
may
in a sense form
part
of a
community
as
wild
animals
do not. Or at least this is true
of
societies
in which a domesticated
animal
belongs
to
a
particular family,
which tends to treat
it
as
a
"honorary
human
being,"referring
o
it,
as one
sign
of
this
attitude,
as
"he" or
"she,"
not
as
"it." Its wants are
respected,
and its ownersfeel
some sense
of
obligation
o
it,
perhaps
o the
degree
that
they
will
not
migrate
to another
country,
or take
a
long
holiday,
if this
means
deserting t. Such a feelingof obligation,however, s onlyjustifiableon
the
assumption
hat to desert one's
pets
is
a
form
of
cruelty
and that
cruelty
is
morally wrong.
Otherwise t can
properly
be
condemned,
n
Spinoza's
manner,
as
superstitious.
It is
sometimes
supposed
hat
compassion
o animals
s a
duty;
as
we have
already
seen,
Kant
gets
into some
difficulty
n
trying
to deter-
mine to whom it is our
duty.
But,
as
Hart has
pointed
out,
there is
somethingvery
odd
in
describing ompassion
as a
duty,
as if a manwho
69Ethics,
Pt.
IV,
Prop.
37,
Note
1.
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214
JOHN
PASSMORE
is cruelto animals s
guilty only
of a
dereliction
of
duty.70
t
is far more
natural
to
describe
compassion
as
good
and
cruelty
to animals as
morally wrong. It can still be granted, o
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