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Animal Rights History Timeline » [1837-1901] Victorian Age » H. A. Herbert

H. A. Herbert

The Sin of Cruelty Towards the Brute Creation

Church of England Magazine

[1848] Rev. H. A. Herbert, Curate of Eldersfield, Worcestershire, "The Sin of Cruelty Towards the Brute Creation," Church of England Magazine 24 (1848-Feb/Mar) 198-201; 210-212; Google Books: Online Library of Free eBooks.

What the sun is to the natural, that Christianity is to the moral world—its universal benefactor. The former confines not is light and heat to the lofty mountain or stately tree, but sheds its genial rays on the smallest blade of grass, and strives to illuminate by its piercing beams the deepest caverns, and, in a word, regards the meanest parts of creation capable of being warmed and enlightened by it. Christianity follows up, and improves on this system of doing good. It consults the happiness and welfare of the works of God's hand in a higher scale of beings than those just noticed, namely, all endued with sense and reason. It regulates the intercourse between man and man. It forbids hatred, malice, and revenge. It allows no one to take advantage of his height of station to oppress or domineer over his humbler breather. It exacts from the king "that sitteth on his throne' the utmost kindness to his meanest subjects; yea, to the "servant that is behind the mill." Highly necessary and beneficial to the community must it be admitted that superiors should be bound by such laws in their demeanour to their inferiours; else society would be distracted by perpetual abuses of authority on the one hand, and perpetual acts of retaliation on the other. Christianity, whenever prevalent, has prevented these sad evils; and, were this the sole range of its benignant spirit, we must confess it to be God's best gift to man. But Christianity does more. Not satisfied with affording protection to the meanest of the human race against the tyranny of his fellow-creatures, it condescends to undertake the cause of the brute tribe against the cruelty of man, both high and low, rich and poor. The humble character of these beings did not place them below the compassionate care of God.

…These duties he makes essential to the character of a Christian, as the words of scripture prefixed to this essay indisputably imply; "A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast:" for from them two inferences may be deduced; first, that to treat humanely animals in our possession constitutes a part of true religion, and will be viewed by God accordingly. …But the words quoted may be made to express another and less consolatory truth. They as naturally imply that he who "regardeth not the life of his beast" forfeits all pretensions to the character of a righteous man. By this single breach of morality he betrays a degree of guilt, for which the most unexceptionable conduct to those of the same flesh and blood can make no amends. Affable though he be to his inferiors, friendly to his equals, respectful to his superiors, these qualities avail him nothing, so long as he regards not the lives and interests of the brute creation. Yet, to the disgrace of human nature, this truth seems forgotten by, alas ! too many.