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Animal Rights History Timeline » [1660-1785] Enlightenment » Alexander Pope

Conversation with Alexander Pope

Anecdotes, Observations and Character, John Spence

[1744] John Spence, "Conversation with Alexander Pope, 1744," in Anecdotes, Observations, and Characters, of Books and Men, Collected from the Conversation of Mr Pope, and Other Eminent Persons of His Time (1820; London, 1858;Digitized by Google; Online at Google Books).

[Spence]—I shall be very glad to see Dr. Hales; and always love to see him, he is so worthy and good a man. [Pope]—Yes, he is a very good man; only I'm sorry he has his hands so much inbrued in blood. [Spence]—What, he cuts up rats? [Pope]—Ay, and dogs too!—[Spence] (With what emphasis and concern he spoke it.)—[Pope] Indeed, he commits most of these barbarities, with the thought of being of use to man: but how do we know, that we have a right to kill creatures that we are so little above as dogs, for our curiosity, or even for some use to us? (222)

[Spence]—I used to carry it too far; I thought they had reason as well as we. [Pope]—So they have to be sure—all our disputes about that, are only disputes about words. Man has reason enough only to know what is necessary for him to know; and dogs have just that too. [Spence]—But then they must have souls too; as unperishable in their nature as ours? [Pope]—And what harm would that be to us? (222-3)