Thomas Young
An Essay on Humanity to Animals
「1798」 Thomas Young, An Essay on Humanity to Animals 「Google Books」 (London, 1798).
「1809」 Thomas Young, An Essay on Humanity to Animals 「Abridged by Permission of the Author」 (London, 1809).
AN ESSAY
ON
HUMANITY TO ANIMALS;
BY THOMAS YOUNG, A.M.
FELLOW OF TRINITY-COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE.
___________________
BLESSED ARE THE MERCIFUL: FOR THEY SHALL
OBTAIN MERCY. ST. MATTHEW V. 7.
___________________
LONDON:
PRINTED FOR T. CADELL, JUN. AND W. DAVIES,
IN THE STRAND; W.H. LUNN, IN OXFORD-
STREE; AND J. DEIGHTON, CAMBRIDGE.
1798.
INSTEAD OF A PREFACE,
I present the Reader with the following
ODE TO HUMANITY
WRITTEN, AT MY REQUEST,
BY MY FRIEND THE REV. C. HOYLE, OF TRINITY-COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE.
CONTENTS
_____________
General Essay on Humanity and Cruelty
to Animals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 1
Chapter I.
II. On Cruelty to Animals, in Sports
peculiar to Children . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
III On Cruelty to Animals, in Sports
common to Men and Boys . . . . . . . . . . 61
IV. On Hunting, Shooting, and Fishing,
for Sport . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
V. On Cruelty to Horses . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
VI. On Cruelty to Animals, with
respect to the Article of Eating. . . . . . . 127
VII. Of killing Bees, in order to take
their Honey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
VIII. Miscellaneous Cruelties to Animals
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .152
IX. To those who have made some
Progress in Humanity . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Biography-Commentary-Excerpts
Reference-Reprints-Reviews
extract from “An Essay on Humanity to Animals, by Thomas Young,” Monthly Epitome 2 (1798 Mar): 88-91.
“We recommend this pathetic and able advocate of those who cannot plead for themselves, to the serious attention of readers of all descriptions. Those who have the education of youth cannot too frequently inculcate the lessons of humanity contained in this essay; as it enforces truths which no rational being can either controvert or overlook; and which total insensibility, or unjustifiable inattention, alone can for a moment obscure. Though the sportsman, in the hardihood of his health, may deem these rules of humanity too tender and refined; and though the epicure may treat them with disregard or contempt; yet to a mind undebased by an inordinate love of pleasure, the benevolent arguments of Mr. Young must carry a full conviction.”— Monthly Review, 25 (1798-Apr): 467-8.
Notwithstanding what moralists have urged—humanity pleaded—and the law threatened—cruelty to animals is still one of the vices of this nation. We recommend this essay to all the horse-racers, cock-fighters, bull-baiters, and stage-coachmen in the kingdom. The arguments of the writer are irresistible, and he had rendered his little work entertaining as well as useful, by a variety of facts gathered from zoology, which will convince the worthy characters above-mentioned that brutes are as sensible of bodily infliction as themselves, though they may not merit it half so much. “And the poor beetle that we tread upon, “In corporal sufferance feels a pang as great ” As when a giant dies.”—Monthly Mirror 5 (1798-May): 293.
We have been much gratified with the contents book: but that there should be occasion for any essay on such a subject is certainly much to be lamented, and reflects the utmost disgrace on the persons for whom it is written.…it appears to us calculated, however, to be very useful, and may be advantageously put into the hands of youth in general, and of all those to whom its momentous exhortations my unhappily appear necessary. Eclectic Review 1 (1809-May): 485
“Several valuable works have been published on the subject: amongst which must be mentioned Mr. Young’s Essay on Humanity to Animals”—Rev. James Plumptre, Three Discourses on the Case of The Animal Creation, and The Duties of Man to Them (London, 1816); andreview of “Three Discourses on the Ease of the Animal Creation, and the Duties of Man to Them, By the Rev. James Plumptre (London, 1816),” Critical Review 4 (1816-Jul): 99-100.
“The return of this paradisiacal state may be rather remote: but in the mean time, we ought to make the experiment and set an example of humanity by abstaining, if not from all, at least from those articles of cookery with which any particular cruelty may be connected, such as veal when the calves are killed in the ordinary way, and so on, of which Mr. Young, in his book on Cruelty, has given a long catalogue.—Thomas Forster, “Of the Cruelty Connected with the Culinary Art,” in Philozoia, or Moral Reflections on the Actual Condition of the Animal Kingdom, (Brussels, 1839) 44.
「1868」Howard Malcom, “Cruelty to Brutes,” in References to the Principal Works in Every Department of Religious Literature (Boston, 1868).
「Thomas Young」bases his plea for animals’ rights on the light of nature.…The book opens with a general essay on humanity and cruelty, and contains chapters on sport, the treatment of horses, cruelties connected with the table, etc., etc. It is quoted approvingly by Thomas Forster and later advocates of humanity.”—Henry Salt, Animals’ Rights Considered in Relation to Social Progress (1892).
