Complete Works of Talbot Mundy

by Talbot Mundy

  Lawrence Trimble recently was at great pains, when in Canada, to discover an authenticated instance of a man having been attacked by wolves. He heard plenty of blood-curdling tales in the cities, fewer in the smaller towns, none in the villages, and in the outlying cabins and places where men know wolves his questions were laughed at. The fact is that not even a starving timber-wolf will attack a man except in self-defense.

  A recent East-Indian census gives the number of human beings killed by wolves in one year as about 380. That is out of a human population of three hundred and twenty-five million people. The percentage is simply insignificant; a far greater percentage of people (to the total population) die on railroad crossings in the United States, or at the hands of ‘civilized’ murderers; and it is noteworthy that nothing whatever is said in that census as to how the human beings came to be killed — whether or not, for instance, they were hunting the wolves.

  The same argument applies to snakes, which are among the very best friends of the agriculturists, but are regarded with horror by nearly all writers of fiction. In India, in any one year, the number of people killed by snake-bite averages about 35,000, which is so small in proportion to the number who die of plague, or cholera, or of knife-wounds o r in proportion to the number who die in the United States of diseases directly brought on by vice — that comparison becomes ridiculous. Most of those deaths by snake-bite are admitted to be due to carelessness, and another considerable proportion of them are due to cruelty attempted on the snakes. Beyond any doubt whatever, the snakes, on the other hand, preserve the lives of millions of people by reducing the number of rats, mice, and insects.

  I have traveled in India from Bombay to the Himalayas, and along the base of the Himalayas into Assam; all up the east coast of Australia; the whole length of Africa, and the whole breadth of that continent from Mombasa to Boma, in every instance living in a tent almost all the time, and penetrating into places where snakes and wild animals were practically the only population. I was only once attacked by a snake — a python; and I would not be willing to take oath that the python actually did attack. I could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I have been attacked by any wild animal whatever, when the animal did not receive first provocation; one of those was a so-called ‘rogue’ elephant, mad with pain from disease at the base of his tusk; one was a rhinoceros, that bore the marks of previous bullet-wounds and consequently had the right to regard man with more than suspicion; one was a female buffalo, whose calf had strayed, so that I was between her and the calf; and the other was a man-eating lion, diseased and decrepit from old age, and about on a par, as to normality, with one of those dope-fed gangsters who make life in American cities dangerous.

  The number of times I have been close to ‘dangerous’ wild animals without really being in the slightest danger from them is beyond computation, for I made a practice for years of getting as close as I possibly could to every species I could find. Without qualification I endorse Mr. Long’s affirmation that wild animals in natural conditions are less dangerous and less treacherous than the human inhabitants of cities — that is, head for head. There are, of course, exceptions, and wherever the balance of nature has been disturbed it is usually profitable not to take unnecessary risks.

  The whole question is closely related in its essence to the problem of disarmament. The supply of deadly weapons and the theory that the other fellow has nefarious intentions psychologize the situation. The false but persistently inculcated teaching that nature is cruel and that all existence is a struggle of the strong against the weak, produces in the human mind a savagery that has no legitimate excuse. When it is once understood that Nature is merciful and considerate of the weak, and that any exceptions to that law are due to unnatural and therefore remediable circumstances, a decidedly wholesome change in human conduct is bound to follow.

  IT IS MAN, NOT NATURE, WHO IS CRUEL

  It is true that a certain small percentage of animals live by killing. Their supply of natural food is in many instances so reduced by the unnecessary ravages of man that they have to become sheep-killers or else starve; and having once killed sheep they would be more than human if they did not continue to follow the line of least resistance and repeat the process indefinitely; but it is the wanton destruction by man of the herds of deer and smaller ‘game’ that diverts them in the first instance from their natural habits. And there ends the whole case against the predatory animals. For in no case are their methods cruel. Mr. Long’s contention is amply supported by the evidence of such well-known explorers as Livingstone and Selous, and very many others, whose unanimous verdict is that some kind of hypnosis accompanies the attack of wild animals; and although its cause may be a question on which scientists and those who have experienced it differ, its result is invariably the same — stupor, in which neither pain nor distress are felt. My own experience in that respect is limited to a single instance, of having been knocked down and stunned by a charging elephant; there was no pain, and not even a headache afterwards. But I have talked with at least a dozen men who have been mauled by ‘big game’ -one of them was tossed by a ‘rhino’ and had nearly every bone in his body broken, but survived — and every one of them assured me that at the time of the attack there was no pain. One man, who was badly torn by a lion, felt no pain for several hours afterwards, and in no single instance did pain begin to be felt for several minutes; it was usually more than half-an-hour. . Bearing in mind that when a lion kills its prey the business is over in less than thirty seconds, it becomes evident that nature’s methods are not unmerciful; and there is certainly no comparison between a swift and painless death in that form and the lingering torture of a steel trap, such as professional hunters set by the thousand, or the agony of wounds caused by badly aimed bullets. The number of men who can invariably kill their animal with one shot is very small indeed, and a great many animals escape, to perish miserably, hiding away in thickets until their wounds stiffen and mortification sets in.

  DO ANIMALS FEEL PAIN?

  There is only one chapter in Mr. Long’s book to which exception can be taken. True, he leaves the answer to his question open, but he takes the attitude that it is impossible to prove whether or not animals feel pain in any circumstances, and he seems rather to incline to the opinion that they do not. However, if it were true that they do not feel pain, then practically the whole of the rest of his contention must go by the board; for what would be the objection to wounding an animal that was incapable of suffering?

  It is difficult to imagine how such an otherwise intelligent and careful observer should persuade himself even to temporize with any such conclusion - unless he adopts the formula of a certain latter-day sect, who maintain that pain has no real existence. But if all pain is imaginary, human beings nonetheless imagine it, and suffer. How exempt animals? What is the difference, except in terms of metaphysical abstraction, between pain and acute suffering endured in the imagination?

  None of Mr. Long’s arguments in this chapter will bear analysis. He cites an instance of a pampered pet-dog that yelled, imagining itself hurt, and ran off perfectly satisfied after a few words of encouragement. But who has not seen a child, or even a grown man, behave in the same way? And is that proof that pain does not exist?

  He admits that animals feel pleasure. How can that be possible, unless they are equally capable of feeling pleasure’s opposite? If they cannot feel pain, how do they learn to avoid things that would otherwise injure them? What is it, if not pain, that enrages them if struck? It is probably right to suppose that an animal’s consciousness, of pain or pleasure, is far removed from that of a human being; but it is nonetheless consciousness, based on sensation and capable of two extremes.

  Animals undoubtedly do not feel pain when killed in the natural way by beasts of prey, because of that provision of nature which induces stupor in the moment of attack; but whoever has witnessed the behavior of an animal caught by the leg in a steel trap must either admit that the ag
ony is atrocious, or else deny that sensation exists for himself or any other creature. it is mere equivocation to assert that what the animal feels is something different from what humans feel. That may be true. But pain by any other name would be as cruel; and the man who will willingly inflict it is a fiend there is no politer name for him.

  The vivisectionists will doubtless hail with glee this chapter of Mr. Long’s. They will quote him as favoring their abominable practices, although he is careful to assure the reader that he holds no brief for them. It would be incredible, if it were not there in bold print, that such a warm-hearted and appreciative observer of Mother Nature should limp so lamely to a half-conclusion.

  Wherein lies nature’s kindness, that he set out to establish and so amply seems to prove, if what is called unkindness should cause no suffering? It is this very blindness to the sufferings of others that leads to all cruelty and all war; and it would be just as logical to assert that because they talk a different language and we cannot feel what they feel, therefore the enemy’s wounded feel no pain and their mothers experience no anguish, as it is to maintain that trapped animals, or vivisected animals, do not suffer. Fortunately, however, that identical argument would destroy the vivisectionist’s case; because a very large percentage of the experiments on living animals are made for the express purpose of discovering what effect pain has on them, and therefore, if they feel no pain, those experiments are useless.

  The truth is that, left to herself, Mother Nature provides full and merciful means for the process of evolution that has been continuing for countless myriads of years. Death comes to us all naturally in due course, and the same Universal Law that governs the constellations takes care of men — and animals. It is only when man, with perverted imagination and a callousness born of lust, ignores the Law and tries to set up new rules for himself, that the balance of nature becomes disturbed and consequences (Karma) supervene that may take centuries on centuries to readjust themselves.

  The only remedy is Brotherhood, and Brotherhood is universal — or else make-believe. The only time to begin to apply the remedy is now. Harm done in the past, and injuries inflicted, cannot be undone. But the process of inflicting injury can cease, and must begin with individuals. It is obvious to anyone at all conversant with Theosophy, that even if it could be proved beyond dispute that vivisection of animals would lead to the total elimination of disease, the price would be too heavy to pay for the result. The cowardice of vivisection is its worst feature. Its effect on those who practise it and, indirectly, on those who profess to benefit from its practice is worse, because it is moral, than the actual physical cruelty inflicted on the helpless animals. And the consequences cannot be escaped; ultimately they will rebound on the human race, that must account sooner or later for all its actions. Justice is inevitable, and is not confined within the limits of one human lifetime.

  I once heard the whole argument for vivisection compressed into a sentence by a Cornish fisherman, who was skinning eels alive. They were squirming horribly, and I protested. The fisherman looked at me with honest blue eyes, shifted his pipe to the other corner of his mouth, went on with the skinning and answered:

  “Lor’ bless ye, boy, they like it!”

  The whole argument against vivisection and all un-brotherhood was summed up centuries ago (and by no means for the first time then) in the advice to “do unto others as ye would they should do unto you.” And the voice of Eternity, as clear as the cry of the birds and the music of wind in the trees and the laughing of water, says: “Both ways lie before you. Choose and take the consequences.” Meanwhile, Mr. Long’s book Mother Nature is a good one and a great advance on the usual method of writing so-called natural history.

  MISCARRIAGE OF JUSTICE

  JUSTICE, according to Xenophon,* was defined by Socrates as “knowledge of what is due to man.” There is no other recorded instance of Socrates having committed himself to definitions, his purpose having been to show what things are not, rather than to limit the boundaries of what they might turn out to be if men would only apply themselves to the discovery. However, as far as it goes, the definition will serve well enough as a guide toward correct conclusions, and injustice, accordingly, might better be defined as ignorance of what is due by man to every living creature.

  There are a great many grades of ignorance, some wilful, some inherited, some due to sheer stupidity, and some that are the consequence of evil habits which have so corrupted thought that even temporary good intentions fail to disperse the mists of prejudice. The effect of ignorance is inevitably disastrous, unless knowledge can by some means be brought to the rescue.

  Mere sentimentalism fails; and mock heroics masquerading as reforming zeal serve only to increase with a cloud of hypocrisy the evils at which they profess to be aimed. Mere appetite for knowledge to be used for personal advancement, being itself only a form of ignorance, is worse than useless in the effort that must certainly be made to lift the world from the state of ignorance into which it has fallen.

  Injustice and ignorance go hand-in-hand invariably, and their result is a degenerating and self-propagating state of selfishness that descends from bad to worse, until it becomes so insupportable that nations wilt as from disease. As far back as we have any historical records, the invariable rule has been that nations which ignored the principle of justice have reaped want, revolution, and dishonor. No nation has ever become great, or sustained its greatness, except by adhering to the highest standards of justice of which it was capable. No armies and no fleets since history began have availed for long to enforce injustice; nor have all the votes of all the electors of any country succeeded in advancing the common prosperity one step when the majority opinion has been unjust.

  There are plenty of instances where ignorant majorities, with dust thrown in their eyes by those who believe they can profit by injustice, have agreed to enforce laws and penalties which favored this or that adroitly organized minority; but there is no instance where the process has succeeded permanently. Despoiled and despised crowds have a way of waking suddenly and transferring the spoils and the scorn to other recipients. Thus ignorance proceeds from bad to worse, injustice finding no remedy by merely making an exchange of victims.

  As great an effort as ever has been made on the material plane to relegate injustice to oblivion was heralded by the famous phrase “all men are born free and equal.” Regarded as an effort, an expression of intention, it was admirable, but there are probably few who pretend that much proof of its truth has been forthcoming. There are many who can point to daily, hourly evidence that seems to prove the contrary.

  The phrase has been explained to mean equality of opportunity. But are there any who will venture to assert, as a result of actual observation, that equality of opportunity exists anywhere in the world today? Conceding that the United States stands alone in advance of all nations in the exercise of justice, is it true, for instance, that the poor man enjoys equal opportunity with the rich before the courts? Is it true that the sons of the poor enjoy the same opportunity to be educated as the sons of the rich? Is it true, to take another instance, that a teacher of Theosophy is as immune from persecution as, say, a politician who advocates international mistrust and rivalry?

  From what, then, are all men free? And to what are they equal? The great nations — great, that is, in wealth and armaments — exclude the weaker nations from an equal voice in international affairs; big business crowds smaller business out of existence; big political organizations suppress individual liberties; men with big brains and no squeamishness mock law by its manipulation for their private profit. Are men or women free from tyranny, robbery, blackmail, prejudice, oppression, violence, libel, slander? And if not, why?

  There are laws beyond count — so many laws that nobody pretends to exact knowledge of more than a small proportion of them. It is evident that the greater the number of laws, the greater the opportunity becomes for clever men to perpetrate injustice, and for rascals to enrich
themselves. Yet there are few who will pretend that in the aggregate the intention of those who elect the law-makers is not to provide equality of opportunity for all. The intention fails; all over the world it has failed so dismally that more than one nation has repudiated democratic government and has submitted to a dictatorship. Nevertheless, not even those dictators will pretend there is no miscarriage of justice in the countries they control. They have contrived to organize intolerance and to make injustice function profitably for a while. They have made material efficiency a goal, without attaining it; but have they even attempted to provide all men with equal opportunity?

  To what are we all equal, or were born equal? Is a rich law-breaker, out on bail, the equal of a vagrant, held in the common lock-up awaiting trial? Is a man born with a genius for music the equal of another man born from a drug-soaked mother in the slums? Is a prize-fighter the equal of a poet; or a painter of landscapes the equal of a man born blind? Do any of those enjoy an equal opportunity? And if so, to do what? To live? Then has a man born with inherited disease an equal opportunity with another man born healthy, amid clean surroundings? It is true, there are many agencies, supported by compassionate and earnest people, who endeavor with all their energy to provide opportunity for those born in poverty and ill-health. But have they succeeded? Why not?