Life, 1895-10-17 · page 8 of 20
Life — October 17, 1895 — page 8: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis of Life Magazine Page 248 This satirical page attacks defenders of animal vivisection (experimentation on living animals). The article "A Gory Falsehood" argues that vivisectionists falsely claim their experiments cause minimal pain, when certain categories of research—particularly nerve experiments and long-term disease studies—are necessarily painful and cannot use anesthetics effectively. The political cartoon on the right depicts "The Wonders of America": a colossal statue of John Jacob Astor (the wealthy industrialist) presented to New York by the Prince of Wales. The caption "And how painless they sound!" sarcastically links Astor's monument to the vivisection debate, likely criticizing American materialism and callousness toward suffering. The bottom humor section offers domestic satire unrelated to the main topic.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
> LIFE: A GORY FALSEHOOD. HE merry vivisector, that jovial spirit the tender heart, takes the trouble at occa- onal intervals to correct the popular delusion that with his experiments on living animals are painful to the victim. Now, although Lire shrinks from apply- ing insulting epithets to a professional person, he ordinary liar so considers the human-hearted immeasurably superior to this modern inquisitor, that he finds a difficulty in properly expressing himself. But, to put it mildly, yet with precision, whenever the advocate of vivisection makes the statement to which we allude, he repeats what he knows to be a falsehood. The facts in the case are that there exist whole classes of experiments in which anzsthetics cannot be used, and most of them are inconceivably painful. These include : (a) Experiments on the nerves. In these the effect of pain is the matter to be observed: to render the animal in- sensible to. pain would, therefore, be to defeat the object of the experiment. (4) Experiments — on the effects of drugs and poisons. In these anws- thetics would render the results of no value, inas- much as the effect of the anesthetic could not be distinguished from that of the drug or poison. (c) Experiments which require long periods of time for their perform- for example, the observing the progress of diseases artificially in- duced. ance, In these experi- ments the use of ana thetics is obviously im- possible; whatever the pain of the disease may be, that pain the animal BARD OUT. must endure. THE WONDERS OF AMERICA. TATUE OF JOHN JACOB ASTOR PRESENTED TO THE ‘Ww YORK BY THE Prince OF WaLes. COLOssAL. Ciry oF } And how painless they sound! Let us hear from some of the mutilated animals on this subject. . HOW HE EXPLAINED IT. T! VIF How did you come to propose to me, John? THE Husbanp: I wanted to be different from other men, | suppos “ H AV exercise.” you smoked that cigar I gave you?" Yo; the doctor says I mustn't take any violent comicbooks.com