As a matter of fact, the better the preposterous system worked, the more fatally it would strangle its victims. Now it is this fact which we all have to try to make clear to our opponents. Humanity growing fat and prosperous on banquets of immolated individuals would be about as disastrous a condition as one could well imagine. As a matter of fact “Humanity”—a mere abstract term used for convenience of speech—has been endowed by careless thinkers with a sort of divine self-existence; and, like most divine beings, this new deity demands sacrifices. For instance, the recent medical proposal to dissect criminals alive in the interests of the Community—another collective-term fetish—reveals, in typical form, the line of sentiment (I can scarcely call it thought) against which we have to contend. I do not say that the majority would not still be shocked at this proposal; but that is simply because it has not yet become familiar. Once it does become familiar, the horror will die away (think of the everyday atrocities which _have_ the public sanction) and then—as there is no principle of personal rights to stand between the proposed victim and the eager experimenter—the latter will be allowed to take his long-coveted prize. He is already permitted to take innocent, sentient creatures, on the plea of the public good; and it is only carrying out the theory to its logical conclusion, to take guilty ones for the same purpose. And on the same plea—like the lie, “an ever present help in time of trouble”—the ordinary citizen will probably follow, in due course. It is a question of time and sentiment, not of principle. Now is it quite impossible to awaken the public to the awful and innumerable dangers which confront us all, as soon as the protection of personal rights is withdrawn? Will not even this threat of human vivisection reveal our utter defencelessness?