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Samuel Jackson Pratt
Humanity, or, The Rights of Nature
 [1788] Samuel Jackson Pratt, Humanity; or, The Rights of Nature, a Poem; in Two Books, By the Author of Sympathy [S. J. Pratt]; reprinted in vol. 3 of Gleanings through Wales (London, 1795); 6th ed. (London, 1802); Google Books: Online Library of Free eBooks) 309-391.
'Tis not enough that daily slaughter fees,
That the fish leaves its stream, the lamb its mead,
That the reluctant ox is dragg'd along,
And the bird ravish'd from its tender song.
That in reward of all her music giv'n,
The lark is murdered as she soars to Heav'n:
"Tis not enough, our appetites require
That on their altars hecatombs expire;
But cruel man, with more than bestial pow'r,
Must heap fresh horrors on life's parting hour:
Full many a being that bestows its breast,
Must prove the pang that waits a ling'ring death,
Here, close pent up, must gorge unwholesome food;
There, render drop by drop the smoking blood;
The quiv'ring flesh improves as slow it dies,
And Luxury see th' augmented whiteness rise;
Some gash;d and mangled feel the torturer's art,
Writhe in their wounds, tho' sav'd each vital part.
Ask you the cause? the food more tender grows,
And callous Lux'ry triumphs in the blows:
For this, are some to raging flames consign'd
While yet alive, to soothe our taste refined!
O pow'r of mercy, that suspends the rod!
O shame to man, impiety to God!
Thou polish'd Christian, in th' untutor'd see
The sacred rights of bles'd HUMANITY.
Thine is the world, thy crimson spoils enjoy,
But let no wanton arts thy soul employ,
Live tho' thou do'st on blood, ah! still refrain
To load thy victims with superfluous pain;
Ev'n the gaunt tyger, tho' no life he saves,
IN gen'rous haste devours what famine craves;
The bestial paw may check thy human hands,
And teach dispatch to what thy want demands,
Abridge thy sacrifice, and hid thy knife
FOR HUNGER KILL, BUT NEVER SPORT WITH LIFE.
Relief appears as the Muse shifts her place,
To where pure manner bless the gentlest race;
Lo, where the BRAMINS pass their blameless life,
Free from proud culture, free from polish'd strife.
To man, brute, insect, nature's constant friends,
The heart embraces and the hand extends;
See the meek tribe refuse the worm to kill,
No murder feeds them, and no blood they spill;
But crop the living herbage as it grows,
And quaff the living water as it flows,
From the full herbs the milky banquet bear,
And the kind herbs repay with pastures fair;
From sanguine man, they drive the game away,
From sanguine man they save the finny prey,
The copious grain they scatter o'er the mead,
The birds to nourish, the beast to fee,
The flow'rs their couch, their roof the arching trees,
And peaceful nights succeed to days of ease.
O! thou proud Christian, aid fair nature's grace,
And catch compassion from the Brahmin race:
Their tender maxims, all that breathe to spare,
Suit not thy cultured state: but thou shouldst know,
Like them, to save from unnecessary woe;
Like them to give each gen'rous feeling birth,
And prove the friend not tyrant of the earth. (336-9)
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