"Suppose we human beings were hunted with traps by a race of giants loo feet high, very ingenious, and absolutely without conscience so far as their treatment of us was concerned. Suppose that, in spite of all our vigilance, we were continually falling into these traps, which were hidden all about us, and compelled in order to escape to eat off our own arms or legs. Suppose that even then one out of every five of us was so ill-starred as to be caught a second time, and ended up, after hours or days of unspeakable agony, by having his head smashed into a jelly by a big club. Suppose we were absolutely helpless in the matter, and that our victimisers had no higher purpose in inflicting these fiendish outrages than to get a scalp or a jawbone to dangle about their demoniacal necks. Suppose, finally, in order to complete the analogy, that these people imagined themselves to be highly civilised and enlightened. What sort of an opinion do you think we would have in the course of ages as to the real character of these people and of their fitness to be the models and superintendents of a planet?"
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Activists from the United StatesAtheists from the United StatesPhilosophers from the United StatesAnimal rights activistsAnti-vivisectionists
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
pp. 70–71
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/J._Howard_Moore
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
J. Howard Moore
John Howard Moore (December 4, 1862 – June 17, 1916) was an American zoologist, philosopher, educator and social reformer. He advocated for the ethical consideration and treatment of animals and authored several articles, books, essays and pamphlets on topics including education, ethics, evolutionary biology, humanitarianism, utilitarianism and vegetarianism. He is best known for his work The Universal Kinship (1906), which advocated for a secular sentiocentric philosophy he called the doctrine
292 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by J. Howard Moore →
Related Quotes
"Well may we be dazed by the horrific metamorphosis. Dark days are upon us. The pendulum of civilization trembles, as …"
"We preach the Golden Rule with an enthusiasm that is well-nigh vehement, and then freckle the globe with huge murder-…"
"There is nothing more frightful to the philosopher than the unconscious tragedies of human reason. Men are somnambuli…"
"It is simply monstrous, this horrible savagery and somnambulism in which we grope. It is the climax of mundane infamy…"
"I sit here tonight in this great city and think back along the years. Life is so full and so different now – full of …"
"Religion is a strictly human infirmity. No other animal has it. It originated far back in the past, when the human wo…"
"It is a crime to start a child learning to read and write as soon as it is out of the cradle. We should get ideas bef…"
"I came to the conclusion out there on the Kansas prairies that the animals were not treated right by human beings. I …"
"Much of the vagueness of the human mind is due to the fact that the mind is largely composed of material derived seco…"
"I have just finished your little book on 'The Logic of Vegetarianism.' It is the best thing on this subject in existe…"