To the London Lancet the cause of humaneness to animals is also indebted, for its repeated condemnation of the cruelties of vivisection. As the exponent and representative of British surgery, its words undoubtedly carried great weight among medical practitioners. In its issue of August 11, 1860, after pointing out the utility of certain physiological inquiries, the Lancet's editor thus defines what it regards as reprehensible cruelty: "On the other hand, when at any moment the practice overpasses the rigorous bounds of utility, when its object is no longer the pursuit of new solutions of scientific problems, or the examination of hypotheses requiring a test; when vivisection is elevated into an art, and this art becomes a matter of public demonstration--then it is degraded by the absence of a beneficent end, and becomes a cruelty. The THE EXHIBITIONS OF EXPERIMENTS WHICH AIM ONLY AT A REPETITION OF INQUIRIES ALREADY SATISFACTORILY CONCLUDED, and the DEMONSTRATION OF FUNCTIONS ALREADY UNDERSTOOD, appear to us to rank among the excesses which must be deplored, if not repressed. The displays in these amphitheatres are of the most painful kind, and it is to be deeply regretted that curiosity should silence feeling, and draw spectators to mortal suffering.... The Commission (of the Societies for Prevention of Cruelty) asks for nothing which the most zealous devotees of science cannot--and ought not--to grant. It demands only the cessation of experiments which are PURELY REPETITIVE DEMONSTRATIONS OF KNOWN FACTS." This is a remarkable utterance. It is quite probable that it voiced an almost unanimous opinion among English physicians and surgeons of half a century ago. How far have we strayed since then! The Lancet of to-day would doubtless earnestly oppose any legal prohibition of experiments which it once ranked among the "excesses which must be deplored, IF NOT REPRESSED." Two or three months afterward the Lancet again expressed its condemnation of experiments made for the demonstration of known facts. In its issue of October 20, 1860, the Lancet editor says: "The moment that it [vivisection] overpasses the bounds of necessity; when it ceases to aim at the solution of problems in which humanity is interested, and becomes a new means of public demonstration, having no benevolent end--then it is degraded to the level of A PURPOSELESS CRUELTY. The repetitive demonstration of known facts, by public or private vivisections, is an abuse that we deplore, and have more than once condemned." On January 12, 1861, the Lancet opens its columns to a correspondent, who invites attention of its readers to the views of Professor Owen, afterward Sir Richard Owen, and the most distinguished anatomist of his time: