VMD 511: Animal Welfare, Ethics and Jurisprudence (2+0)

QUOTATIONS ABOUT ANIMAL RIGHTS

"We cannot have peace among men whose hearts find delight in killing any living creature." - Rachel Carson, American Author and Marine Biologist

"Every year tens of thousands of animals suffer and die in laboratory tests of cosmetics and household products, despite the fact that the test results do not help prevent or treat accidental or purposeful misuse of the products. Please join me in using your voice for those whose cries are forever sealed behind the laboratory doors." - Woody Harrelson, Actor

"The brute animals have all the same sensations of pain as human beings, and consequently endure as much pain when their body is hurt; but in their case the cruelty of torment is greater, because they have no mind to bear them up against their sufferings, and no hope to look forward to when enduring the last extreme pain." - Thomas Chalmers, Scottish Religious Leader

"True benevolence or compassion, extends itself through the whole of existence and sympathizes with the distress of every creature capable of sensation." - Joseph Addison, English Poet

"Life is life's greatest gift. Guard the life of another creature as you would your own because it is your own. On life's scale of values, the smallest is no less precious to the creature who owns it than the largest." - Lloyd Biggle Jr.

"A man is ethical only when life, as such, is sacred to him, that of plants and animals as well as that of his fellowman, and when he devotes himself helpfully to all life that is in need of help." - Dr. Albert Schweitzer, Alsatian Theologian, Musician, and Medical Missionary

"My doctrine is this: that if we see cruelty or wrong that we have the power to stop, and we do nothing, we make ourselves sharers in the guilt." - Anna Sewell, English Novelist

"Providing food and shelter is not proving love for your pet. Those too, but proper care and protection from harm make the truest sense of responsible pet ownership." - John D. Carraway, DVM, enscribed hanging office plaque of his professional motto, FancyBoy and JoJo's Vet

"First they went after the Communists, and I did not stand up, because I was not a Communist. Then they went after the homosexuals and infirm, and I did not stand up, because I was neither. Then they went after the Jews, and I did not stand up, because I was not a Jew. Then they went after the Catholics, and I did not stand up, because I was Protestant. Finally, they went after me, and there was no one left to stand up for me." - Martin Neimoller, German Pastor who spent 8½ years in a Nazi Concentration Camp

"He who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals." - Immanuel Kant, German Philosopher

"Animals are such agreeable friends, they ask no questions, they pass no criticisms." - George Eliot, Female English Novelist (Mary Ann Evans)

"We cannot glimpse the essential life of a caged animal, only the shadow of its former beauty." - Julia Allen Field (1937- )

"The awful wrongs and sufferings forced upon the innocent, helpless, faithful animal race, form the blackest chapter in the whole world's history." - Edward Freeman, English Freelance Historian and Journalist

"The assumption that animals are without rights, and the illusion that our treatment of them has no moral significance, is a positively outrageous example of Western crudity and barbarity. Universal compassion is the only guarantee of morality." - Arthur Schopenhauer, German Philosopher

"A man is truly ethical only when he obeys the compulsion to help all life which he is able to assist, and shrinks from injuring anything that lives." - Albert Schweitzer, Alsatian Theologian, Musician, and Medical Missionary

"Cherish the wonderful ways our animals are models of living life to the fullest, loving unconditionally, embracing the passion within, and being completely in the present moment." - Susan White

"I have always felt that the way we treat animals is a pretty good indicator of the compassion we are capable of for the human race." - Ali McGraw, American Actress

"The time will come when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals as they now look upon the murder of men." - Leonardo Da Vinci, Italian Painter, Sculptor, Architect, Musician, Engineer, and Scientist

"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated." - Mahatma Gandhi, Indian Statesman and Philosopher

"Of all the creatures, man is the most detestable. Of the entire brood, he's the one that possesses malice. He is the only creature that inflicts pain for sport, knowing it to be pain. The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to the other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creature that cannot." - Mark Twain, American Novelist

"You have to love animals for what they are or leave them alone. The best thing you can do if you love them is leave them alone and see that other people do too." - Pat Derby (1942- )

"What is man without the beasts? If all the beasts were gone, men would die from great loneliness of spirit. For whatever happens to the beasts, soon happens to man. All things are connected." - Chief Seattle American Indian Duwamish Tribe

"True human goodness, in all its purity and freedom, can come to the fore only when its recipient has no power. Mankind's true moral test, its fundamental test (which lies deeply buried from view), consists of its attitude towards those who are at its mercy: animals. And in this respect mankind has suffered a fundamental debacle, a debacle so fundamental that all others stem from it." - Milan Kundera, Czech Novelist

"If only we can overcome cruelty, to human and animal, with love and compassion we shall stand at the threshold of a new era in human moral and spiritual evolution - and realize, at last, our most unique quality: humanity." - Jane Goodall, Author of Reason for Hope

"Until we have the courage to recognize cruelty for what it is...whether its victim is human or animal...we cannot expect things to be much better in this world...We cannot have peace among men whose hearts delight in killing any living creature. By every act that glorifies or even tolerates such moronic delight in killing we set back the progress of humanity." - Rachel Carson, American Biologist and Novelist

"We must fight against the spirit of unconscious cruelty with which we treat the animals. Animals suffer as much as we do. True humanity does not allow us to impose such sufferings on them. It is our duty to make the whole world recognize it. Until we extend our circle of compassion to all living things, humanity will not find peace." - Albert Schweitzer, Alsatian Theologian, Musician, and Medical Missionary

"The man who kills the animals today is the man who kills the people who get in his way tomorrow." - Dr. Diane Fossey, Woman in the Mists (Dr. Fossey was killed by someone who killed animals yesterday.)

"To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards out of men." - Abraham Lincoln, Sixteenth President of the United States

"The worst sin toward our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them; that's the essence of humanity." - George Bernard Shaw, Irish Playwright and Critic

"Cruelty to animals is one of the most significant vices of a low and ignoble people. Wherever one notices them, they constitute a sign of ignorance and brutality which cannot be painted over even by all the evidence of wealth and luxury." - Alexander Von Humbolt, German Naturalist

"The quiet conscience is the invention of the devil. No one of us may permit any preventable pain to be inflicted even though the responsibility for that pain is not ours. No one may shut his eyes and think that the pain which is therefore not visible, is nonexistent." - Albert Schweitzer, Alsatian Theologian, Musician, and Medical Missionary

"You cannot do a kindness too soon, because you never know how soon it will be too late." - Ralph Waldo Emerson, American Essayist and Philosopher

"It is as if life had said, 'I am going to send you into a world of cruelty. I shall make you sensitive to pain, fear, heat, cold, hunger and starvation. In this world of cruelty, I shall make you defenseless. In addition, I shall strike you dumb.' This is the kind of world that animals are born into." - Grace Johnson, Animal Activist

"All the beautiful sentiments in the world weigh less than a single lovely action." - James Russell Lowell, American Poet and Essayist

"Very little of the great cruelty shown by men can really be attributed to cruel instinct. Most of it comes from thoughtlessness or inherited habit. The roots of cruelty, therefore, are not so much strong as widespread. But the time will come when inhumanity protected by custom and thoughtlessness will succumb before humanity championed by thought. Let us work that this time may come." - Albert Schweitzer, Alsatian Theologian, Musician, and Medical Missionary

"To close your eyes will not ease another's pain." - Chinese Proverb

"The most solid comfort one can fall back upon is the thought that the business of one's life is to help in some small way to reduce the sum of ignorance, degradation, and misery on this earth." - George Eliot, Female English Novelist (Mary Ann Evans)

"These birds and animals and fish cannot speak, but they can suffer, and our God who created them, knows their sufferings, and will hold him who causes them to suffer unnecessarily to answer for it. It is a sin against their Creator." - George Q. Cannon, Animal Activist

"Cruelty to dumb animals is one of the distinguishing vices of the lowest and basest of the people - wherever it is found, it is a certain mark of ignorance and meanness." - Jones of Nayland

"It is totally unconscionable to subject defenseless animals to mutilation and death, just so a company can be the first to market a new shade of nail polish or a new, improved laundry detergent. It's cruel, it's brutal, it's inhumane, and most people don't want it." - Abigail 'Dear Abby' Van Buren Testifying before the House Judiciary Committee in support of the Consumer Products Safe Testing Act, March 1988

"The Animals of the planet are in desperate peril and they are fully aware of this. No less than human beings are doing in all parts of the world, they are seeking sanctuary." - Alice Walker, "Selected Writings," Living by the Word

"Love of animals is a universal impulse, a common ground on which all of us may meet. By loving and understanding animals, perhaps we humans shall come to understand each other." - Louis J. Camuti, D.V.M., First American vet to devote his practice exclusively to cats.

"I abhor vivisection. It should at least be curbed. Better, it should be abolished. I know of no achievement through vivisection, no scientific discovery, that could not have been obtained without such barbarism and cruelty. The whole thing is evil." - Dr. Charles Mayo, Founder of the Mayo Clinic.