SHAKESPEARE ON VIVISECTION.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTLTOIL"] Sin,—You have more than once urged that there is a danger lest vivisection should harden the hearts of those who practise it. I do not know whether you have noticed that Shakespeare said the same thing soine three hundred years ago. In Cymbeline (Act i., sc. 5), the Queen proposes to try her noxious drugs on animals. Cornelius, the good physician, responds that to do so will harden her heart. The passage
is this :—
" Queen. I will try the for,-;es Of these thy compounds on such creatures as We count not worth the hanging, but none human, To try the vigour of them, and apply
Allayments to their act, and by them gather Their several virtues and effects.
Cornelius. Your highness Shall from this practice but make hard your heart."
When the Queen speaks of applying "allayments to their act," she might almost be supposed to refer to anteathetics, though no doubt what she really speaks of is antidotes.—I
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