Ɛpsilon

To Werner von Voigts-Rhetz   14 May 1881

Private

Dear Sir,—

Although I am resolved not to enter into any controversy on vivisection, yet the great courtesy of your letter compels me to answer it.1 I published my letter to Prof. Holmgren, solely as I thought it my duty to do so, having long deliberated on the subject.—2 In a short 2d letter published in the Times (April 22d) I have given though too briefly, my reasons for believing that English Physiologists do not deserve the accusations heaped on them.3 The R. Commission was granted not on account of any sufficient evidence of cruelty, but from vague & as I believe unfounded rumours— You quote Dr Hoggan & his published letters wd have led anyone to suppose that he referred to English Laboratories, but when examined he was forced to confess that he had not seen any experiments performed in England.—4 Dr Kleins conduct has always been [illeg] to me, & I suspect that he spoke out of bravado with the intention of studying Englishness5 The sole point which I regret in my first letter to the Times is that I did not express more plainly my belief that useless suffering has been & probably is still caused in foreign laboratories; but I positively know so many atrociously false accusations have been published in this country against physiologists, that I felt somewhat sceptical with respect foreign lands.— You quote Zollner as authority but I am surprised that anyone shd. trust in his judgment.6 Cuvier never attended to Physiology.7 With respect to Sir W. Thompson though the greatest of physicists he knows nothing about physiology or biology; & he informed my son, that a lady, who is vehement anti vivisectionist, to whom he had written on the subject had interpolated sentences in his answer & had then published them as coming from him.8

Finally I cannot modify my deliberate conviction, that he who arrests the progress of physiology, commits a crime against mankind.—

With my renewed thanks for the courtesy of your letter, I remain Dear Sir | respectfully

To à | M. W. de Voigts-Rhetz | Oberkirch | G. Duché de Baden | Germany

May 14th 1881

ADraft

2
See letter to Frithiof Holmgren, [14] April 1881; the letter was printed in The Times, 18 April 1881, p. 10.
3
In his letter to the editor of The Times, 21 April [1881], CD highlighted conclusions in the Report of the Royal Commission on vivisection that differentiated the practices of English physiologists regarding the treatment of animals from those of foreigners.
4
Voigts-Rhetz had referred to claims made by George Hoggan about animal experimentation; Hoggan had admitted that he had never personally seen experiments without anaesthetics performed before students in his testimony to the Royal Commission (Report of the Royal Commission on vivisection, p. 180).
5
Edward Emanuel Klein had admitted that he used anaesthetics only for the sake of convenience (Report of the Royal Commission on vivisection, p. 184). For more on the impact of his testimony, see French 1975, pp. 103–6. For CD’s reaction at the time, see Correspondence vol. 23, letter to T. H. Huxley, 1 November [1875].
6
See letter from Werner von Voigts-Rhetz, [after 18 April 1881] and n. 12. Voigts-Rhetz had quoted from a letter from Ernst Haeckel to Johann Karl Friedrich Zöllner. CD alludes to Zöllner’s ideas on spiritualism and the existence of a fourth spatial dimension (see Stromberg 1989 for more on Zöllner’s views on spiritualism).
7
Georges Cuvier was best known as a systematist and comparative anatomist. Voigts-Rhetz had quoted Cuvier as having claimed that nature supplied the means of learning what experiments on animals would never teach (letter from Werner von Voigts-Rhetz, [after 18 April 1881] and n. 11).
8
For William Thomson’s statement at a meeting of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals held in Glasgow, see the letter from Werner von Voigts-Rhetz, [after 18 April 1881] and n. 7. For more on Thomson’s position on vivisection, see Thompson 1910, 2: 1105–6.

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

1.1 am] above del ‘had’
1.1 vivisection] above del ‘the subject of experiments on living animals.’
1.2 compels] after del ‘lea’
1.2 it] above del ‘you briefly’
1.3 deliberated on] above del ‘& anxiously reflected on’
1.5 though too briefly,] interl
1.5 do] above del ‘did’
1.6 granted not] interl above del ‘formed’
1.7 sufficient] above del ‘good’
1.7 & … unfounded] interl
1.9 referred to] above del ‘had witnessed cruelties in’
1.10 not] interl
1.10 any] above del ‘no’
1.10 Dr … Englishness 1.12] interl
1.11 suspect] below del ‘believe’
1.11 spoke] after del ‘was [saddened with regret] &’
1.12 Englishness] below del ‘English admiration’
1.12 point] after del ‘cr’
1.13 to the Times is] ‘to the Times’ above ‘is’; ‘is’ above del ‘was’
1.13 useless suffering 1.14] above del ‘cruelty’
1.14 & probably is still] interl; ‘probably’ below del ‘perhaps’
1.14 positively know 1.15] above del ‘*ascertained that [above del ‘have known’]’
1.15 atrociously] after del ‘cases of’
1.15 accusations] after del ‘& atrocious’
1.15 have] after interl and del ‘of cruelty’
1.17 as authority] interl before ‘Zollner’ and transposed
1.17 I am] after del ‘I have never heard that he has attended to physiology &’
1.17 trust] above del ‘think’
1.18 Cuvier … Physiology] interl; ‘never attended to’ above del ‘was not’; ‘Physiology’ altered from ‘Physiologist’
1.18 though … physicists 1.19] interl
1.19 about … biology;] above del ‘of Biology’
1.20 that] after del ‘that his [above del ‘the’] opinion *on vivisection [interl] which he expressed had been’
1.20 anti] above del ‘against’
1.20 vivisectionist] ‘ist’ added
1.20 to whom … subject 1.21] interl
2.1 cannot modify my] above del ‘must repeat beg leave to repeat my’
4.1 Baden] above del ‘Grand Duché | de Baden’

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-13156,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-13156