and fome of them had the confidence to plead in favour of it! The unnatural and inhuman behaviour of man, or rather of the Engleishman, toward his fellow-creatures, is represented, with fingular energy, by William Cowper, in the following beautyful passage: "Thus harmony and family accord Or his bafe gluttony, are caufes good And just, in his account, why bird and beast Within the confines of their wild domain ! That wait on man, the flight-performing horse: His murd❜rer on his back, and, push'd all day, Th' inglorious feat, and, clamorous in praise Task, B. 6. "The king travelled with fo much expedition to Cheltenham, that three hack-horses were killed on the road. Di Thomfon, haveing slightly touched upon "the fportsman's joy," or, "rural game," proceeds with the following lines: "These are not subjects for the peaceful muse, The chace of the hare and ftag is no lefs eloquent and pathetick; but is not likely to have rections were given to the drivers to proceed with the utmost expedition, which they took as a hint not to spare the beafts. His majesty paid for the horses; one of them coft thirty pounds." (Morning Herald, July 18, 1788.) much effect on the favage monfters devoted to those pursuits. It is indeed, obferves Plutarch, a hard and difficult task to undertake (as Cato once fay'd) to dispute with mens bellys that have no ears... and it is no easey task to pul out the hook of flesheating from the jaws of such as have gorge'd themselves with luxury, and are, as it were, nail'd down with it. It would, indeed, be a good action, if, as the Aegyptians draw out the ftomach of a dead body, and cut it open and expose it to the fun, as the onely caufe of all its evil actions, fo we could by cuting out our gluttony and blood-fheding, purify and cleanse the remainder of our lives... But if this may not be, and we are ashame'd, by reason of custom, to live unblameablely, let us, at least, sin with discretion: Let us eat flesh, but let it be for hunger, and not for wantonnefs. Let us kil an animal, but let us do it with forrow and pity, and not abuseing and tormenting it, as many now-a-days are ufe'd to do, while fome run red hot fpits through the bodys of fwine, that by the tincture of the quench'd iron the blood may be to that degree mortify'd, that it may sweeten and foften the flesh in its circulation: and others jump and stamp upon the udders of sows that are ready to pig, that fo they may take off (Oh! pia» cular Jupiter!), in the very pangs of delivery, blood, milk, and corruption,* (deftroying the young ones befide), and fo eat the most inflame'd and diseafe'd part of the animai: others fow up the eyes of cranes and swans, and fo fhut them up in darkness to be faten'd, and then fowce up their flesh with certain monstrous mixtures and pickles. * By all which it is most manifeft, that it is not for nourishment, or want, or any necesfity, but for mere gluttony, wantonnefs, and expensiveness, that they make a pleasure of villainy... The begining of a vicious diet is presently follow'd by all forts of luxury and expensiveness : and what meal is not expenfive, for which an animal is put to death? Shal we reckon a foul to be a fmall expence? I wil not fay, perhap, of a mother, or a father, or of fome friend, as Empedocles did; but one participateing of feeling, of feeing, of hearing, of imagination and of intellection, which each of them hath receiv'd from nature for the acquireing of what is agreeable to it, and the avoiding what is disagreeable. Do but confider with yourself, which fort of philofophers render us moft tame and civil, they who bid * This wil, doubtlefs, be particularly disgufting to the humane Engleish reader, for whom fimilar crueltys, or others at least equally shocking, are every day commited. |