This, too, at once suggests the moral question, Is it right? There is no necessity, for our present purpose, to moot that question. We have, over and over again, challenged investigation; but the case is too clear to admit of discussion. Again, although we humbly submit that the moral bearing of philosophical questions must always be a legitimate subject of inquiry, yet it is inexpedient to introduce that question where it is not required. The questions whether the progress of physiology has been _accelerated_ by experiments on living animals, or whether the _treatment of diseases_ has been improved by that mode of inquiry, or whether it has _tended to mislead people_ into erroneous and mischievous views, are all things that admit of proof entirely independent of moral considerations. Now we should be sorry to appear to undervalue that which we most highly prize, or to represent that to be irrelevant which is, in all subjects, the great consideration; but it is wise to take the ground chosen by those who argue in support of a fallacy; not that which they would ignore, or regard as disputable. As we have already observed, we think it demonstrable that experiments on living animals, _involving cruelty_, have been entirely unproductive, whilst they have tended to mislead more than any other mode of investigation whatever. Many years since, we corrected some very extraordinary mis-statements in regard to the experiments of Orfila, Sir Charles Bell, and others, which could only be accounted for by a want of attention to the works from which they were selected; for it is curious to observe that (though different in kind) the most conclusive evidence of the erroneous value attributed to the experiments is furnished by the distinguished authors themselves. Orfila wished to know what would be the effect of various poisons on the animal economy. He therefore set to work as follows:—He opened the gullet of a living animal, put in the poison, and then tied the tube; and this to ascertain how the stomach dealt with substances of this kind taken into that organ. Now there have been, unfortunately, too many instances afforded, by accidents and by suicides, of these very things in the human subject; presenting us with a series of facts, deplorable enough, it is true, but which, regarded merely as grounds of philosophical inquiry, are comparatively free from objection; whilst the experiments made by Orfila on his tortured animals are obviously loaded with all the elements of fallacy. It is surely not necessary to urge, as one of these, so serious a preliminary as placing a ligature on the gullet. We say nothing of the horrible cries that Orfila describes these animals as uttering; but surely, if the object had been to interfere with and obscure the processes of nature by every conceivable ingenuity, one could not have imagined any conditions better calculated for this purpose.