The Reality of 
Human Vivisection 
A REVIEW 
OF A LETTER BY WILLIAM W. KEEN, M.D., LL.D. 
LATE PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICA# WEDICAL ASSOCIATION. 
"Homo sum; humani 
nihil a me alienum puto." 
BOSTON 
I9OI. The Reality of 
Human Vivisection 
A REVIEW 
OF A LETTER BY WILLIAM W. KEEN, M.D., LL.D. 
LATE PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION. 
"Homo sum; humani 
nihil a me alienum puto." 
A-web/cA-h Assoc, n 
BOSTON 
1901 INTRODUCTION. 
The following letter was sent by Hon. James M. Brown, 
President of the American Humane Association, to Dr. William 
W. Keen, of Philadelphia. It explains itself. 
THE AMERICAN HUMANE ASSOCIATION : 
SOCIETIES OF THE UNITED STATES ORGANIZED FOR THE 
Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and Children. 
Toledo, Ohio, Oct. 4, 1900. 
Prof. William W. Keen, M. D., late President of the American Medical 
Association, Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia. 
Dear Sir:-My attention has just been called to a passage in the published 
" Report of the Hearings" before the Senate committee, held at Washington last 
February, on the bill for regulation of vivisection. In this volume the following 
conversation between Senator Gallinger and yourself is recorded : 
Senator Gallinger-What knowledge have you of the advances made by 
vivisectionis'ts that have led them to progress from the brute creation to the human 
creation in making these so-called vivisection experiments? 
Dr. Keen-I presume you refer to a pamphlet issued by the American 
Humane Society. I have only to say in reference to it that there were a number 
of experiments which I would utterly ondemn. Of the experiments narrated in 
that pamphlet, I have looked up every one that I could. Only two are alleged to 
have been done in America. Many of them are so vague and indefinite that I 
could not look them up, but as to those that I could, some are garbled and inac- 
curate ; not all of them, observe. 
A statement of this character, based upon such authority, it is impossible to 
ignore. Proceeding from one less eminent than yourself in that profession which 
you represent and adorn, it might pass without notice, but coming from you, sir, 
such a charge must be investigated and probed to the fullest extent. Its impor- 
tance is evident, and in testing its accuracy you will give me, I trust, every assist- 
ance within your power. 
First: Regarding the cases of experimentation upon human beings recorded 
in our pamphlet, "Human Vivisection," you informed the Senate committee that 
" Many of them are so vague and indefinite that I could not look them up." We 
challenge the accuracy of that statement, and ask for proof. Of the various series 
of experiments upon human beings, made for the most part upon women and chil- 
dren in hospitals and infirmaries, the authorities given in this pamphlet are as 
follows : 2 
Introduction. 
1. Bulletin of the Johns Hopkins Hospital for July, 1897. 
2. Boston Medical and Surgical Journal for Aug. 6 and 13, 1896 ; 
The Philadelphia Polyclinic for Sept. 5, 1896. 
3. New York Medical Record for Sept. 10, 1892. 
4. The British Medical Journal for July 3, 1897 ; the New England Medi- 
cal Monthly for March, 1898. 
5. The Medical Press for December 5, 1888 ; the British Medical Journal 
for Aug. 29, 1891 ; the London Times for June 27, 1891, (and other 
journals). 
6. The Medical Brief for June, 1899. 
7. Ringer's Therapeutics, pp. 585, 588, 590, 591, 498, 503 ; the London 
Lancet for Nov. 3, 1893. 
8. The Newcastle Daily Chronicle for Sept. 21, 1888. 
9 The Medical Press and Circular for March 29, 1899 ; The London 
Lancet for May 6, 1899, p. 1261. 
10. The Allg. Wiener med. Zeitung, Nos. 50 and 51. 
11. Deutsche med. Wochenschrift, Nos. 46 and 48 of year 1894. 
12. Deutsche med. Wochenschrift, of Feb. 19, 1891. 
13. Lecture before Medical Society of Stockholm, Sweden. May 12, 1891. 
14. The British Medical Journal for Oct. 15, 1881 ; Medical Reprints for 
May 16. 1893 ; the Nineteenth Century for Dec., 1895. 
For one series of experiments in the above list, those made by Dr. Jansen 
upon children of the "Foundlings' Home"-with the "kind permission" of the 
head physician, Professor Medin-because, as he said, "calves were so expensive," 
it appears that the only authority given was' a reference to his lecture delivered 
before a Swedish medical society upon a certain date. Although, so far as known, 
the facts there stated have never been denied, yet the reference may, perhaps, be 
called indefinite. But one case is not "many." To what other of the references 
above given did you refer when you informed the Senate committee that "wrawj 
of them were so vague and indefinite that Lcould not look them up?" Had you 
stated that your library-ample as it is-did not contain, and could not be expected 
to contain, all of the foreign authorities to which reference was made there would 
have been nothing to criticize. I must assume, sir, that you have not put forth an 
aspersion of another's reliability merely to have acknowledgment of the inadequacy 
of your sources of reference ; that the proofs of your statement, covering 
cases, are available, and, in the interest of accuracy, I ask you to produce them. 
Second: There is yet another point to which I ask your attention. You made 
the statement before the Senate committee that in regard to our published account 
of cases of humin vivisection, " many of them are so vague and indefinite that I 
could not look them up; but, as to those that L could, some are garbled and inac- 
curate; not all of them, observe." 
This, sir, is a most serious charge. You distinctly declared that of the cases 
personally investigated by yourself, as quoted in the pamphlet on " Human Vivi- 
section," some are "garbled and inaccurate." We deny the charge, and again 
challenge production of evidence upcn which it is made. 
A "garbled" quotation is one which, by reason of omission and perversions, 
is essentially unfair. Sometimes it is a statement from which parts are omitted or 
transposed for the purpose of conveying a false impression. To omit quotation 
of parts not directly bearing upon the question for the sake of brevity-this is not Introduction. 
3 
"garbling," for all quotation would then be impossible. We assert that in quot- 
ing accounts of the cases of human vivisection no omissions of essential facts have 
been made sufficient to impair the accuracy or fairness of the quotation. Let us 
put the matter to the test. Point out, if you can, the "some cases" which you 
found "garbled and inaccurate," and in proof of the charge quote the omitted sen- 
tences or ivords which, had they been inserted, would cause you and the general 
public to justify and approve the experiments on human beings which we have so 
severely condemned. 
Third: You stated, sir, before the Senate Committee that only two experi- 
ments upon human beings "are alleged to have been done in America." I question, 
sir, whether that remark is quite in accord with the highest ideals of truth ; it is 
the language of doubt; it seems to signi/y and imply that even you are aware of 
no other experiments upon human beings than two cases which are thus "alleged." 
I am very confident, sir, that you will not venture formally to assert-what you 
have seemed to imply-that you know of but two experiments upon human beings 
made in this country and recorded in the medical literature of the United States. 
There is indeed need of further enlightenment, if the medical profession of this 
country, so worthily represented by yourself, is ignorant of what has been done by 
men without pity and without conscience. 
Trusting to have response from you at an early date, I am, 
Yours most truly, 
James M. Brown, 
, President. 
After nearly four months delay, Dr. Keen made a long and 
rambling reply, containing innumerable errors and misstate- 
ments of every kind, which he has caused to be printed in the 
Journal of the American Medical Association and in the Phila- 
delphia Medical Journal in their issue of February 23, 1901, 
and in pamphlet form for general circulation. No sufficient 
rej'oinder to his letter would be admitted to the columns of 
these medical periodicals. But such gross errors should not be 
permitted to pass unchallenged ; and some partial exposure 
of its misstatements follows herewith. THE REALITY OF HUMAN VIVISECTION: 
A REVIEW OF DR. KEEN'S LETTER. 
At last we have from the pen of a physician and surgeon, 
widely known throughout the United States what is practically 
an apology for the practice of Human Vivisection. Purporting 
merely to criticise a pamphlet exposing the atrocity in ques- 
tion, he spares no argument that might tend to exonerate 
those charged with this offense, or that would cast odium 
upon those who have unveiled to the public eye the horrors of 
hospital experimentation upon the helpless and the poor. 
The appearance of this defense,- we can give it no other 
name,-is of peculiar and painful significance, and fully justi- 
fies the apprehensions which have long been felt. 
Its evolution is of interest. At the "Hearing" before a 
Senate Committee in Washington, February 21, 1900, Senator 
Gallinger called attention of Dr. William W. Keen, then under 
examination, to certain phases of scientific experimentation 
upon human beings. " I presume," said Dr. Keen in reply, 
"you refer to a pamphlet issued by the American Humane 
Association. I have only to say in reference to it that there 
were a number of experiments which I would utterly condemn. 
Of the experiments narrated in that pamphlet I have looked 
up every one that I could. Only two are alleged to have been 
done in America. Many of them are so vague and indefinite 
that I could not look them up, but as to those that I could, 
some are garbled and inaccurate, not all of them, observe."* 
How skilfully is vague reprehension,-without one single 
specification,-mixed with insinuation of unreliability and 
literary fraud ! The president of the American Humane Asso- 
ciation in a letter printed herewith, challenged Dr. Keen 
* Hearing before the Senate Committee (on Vivisection) February 21, 1900, 
page 30. 6 
The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
to make good his words ; and after some months' delay, he 
has published his reply in the "Journal of the American Medi- 
cal Association " of February 23, 1901, and printed it for distri- 
bution in pamphlet form. 
It is a document which it is difficult to characterize. By 
minutest criticism of words, by disparagement and detraction 
in all conceivable ways, or by actual misstatements of fact, he 
has endeavored to convey the impression that the charges of 
experimentation upon human beings, are on the whole, incredi- 
ble and absurd; that legitimate methods of medical and 
surgical treatment have been viciously or ignorantly exagger- 
ated into " experiments,"-when there was no experiment;- 
and that no cause exists for denouncing the men who have 
been charged with these horrible deeds. Of one series of ex- 
periments only, (the unspeakably vile and atrocious investi- 
gations of Menge,) does Dr. Keen affirm his condemnation ; 
but the intensity of his disapproval he at once permits us to 
measure by the statement that " to misrepresent these experi- 
ments is scarcely less culpable than to perform them I " Here, 
at any rate, we feel sure that Dr. Keen speaks his mind ; and 
that these inoculations of new-born babes,-wrapped at their 
birth in sterile towels and conveyed from the bedside to the 
laboratory for experimentation ("sofort nach der Geburt in 
sterile Tiicher gehult, und im Laboratorium zu den Versuchen 
verwendet,")* stand in his judgment on a moral equality with 
a translator's exaggeration, or the blunders of a copyist ! 
The impression of a careful reader of Dr. Keen's letter may 
be that in these apologetic references to human vivisectors he 
has gone a little too far. But should we not remember that he 
is writing in defense of others? To what extent an advocate 
in discharging his duty may be allowed to overstep those 
bounds of fairness or of veracity which ordinarily govern 
the conduct of honorable men, is a question upon which the 
highest authorities are not agreed ; but it is certain that he 
may go very far. Lord Brougham, before he became the Lord 
Chancellor of England, in one of the greatest of his speeches 
delivered before the House of Lords, laid down the law by 
which he was governed in the following terms : 
* Deutsche Med Wochenschrift, November 29, 1894, p. 907. The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
7 
" An'advocate, by the sacred duty which'he owes his client, knows in the dis- 
charge of that office but one person in the world,-THAT CLIENT AND NONE OTHER. 
To save that client by all means and expedients, to protect that client at all 
hazards and costs to all others,-and among others, to himself, is the highest and 
most unquestioned of his duties ; and he must not regard the alarm-the suffering 
-the torment,-the destruction which he may bring upon any other. Nay, separ- 
ating the duties of a patriot from those of an advocate and casting them, if need be, 
to the wind, he must go on, reckless of consequence, if his fate it should unhappily 
be to involve his country in confusion for his client's protection."* 
Human vivisection may be said to be on trial before Public 
Opinion. It has been impeached as opposed to the spirit of 
Christianity, on account of its cruelty and for its absolute dis- 
regard of human rights; and Dr. Keen, let us say, appears 
for the defense. Now, in the criticisms we propose to make 
of Dr. Keen's paper, certain clear distinctions should be 
kept in mind. For Professor Keen, the skillful surgeon, the 
prominent member of a leading Christian denomination, we 
have great respect. For Dr. Keen, the specious apologist of 
human vivisectors, and for his methods of advocacy-" by all 
means and expedients,"-we shall not be sparing in exposure or 
criticism. If we show that for the sake of human vivisectors 
he has hesitated at no trick of defensive palliation in behalf 
of unspeakable outrages upon the weak and defenseless, 
let it be understood that we are denouncing merely the advo- 
cate and not the man. If such advocacy has imposed silence 
where we had hoped for outspoken condemnation ; if he 
has abundant epithets of scorn and vituperation for the errors 
of a translator, but no words of mildest censure for the vilest 
crimes against Humanity,-the inoculation of innocent chil- 
dren with foul disease, the grafting of cancers into the healthy 
breasts of unconscious women by men of his profession, or the 
inoculation of hospital patients with yellow fever; if un- 
bounded zeal has Carried him even beyond the borders of 
truth, and caused him sometimes to rely upon petty tricks of 
duplicity and equivocation, we shall assume that it is due to 
that mistaken advocacy which he so unwisely undertook. Of 
that unwisdom we have no doubt. The vileness of the prac- 
tice, which he attempted to defend by interposition of his pro- 
* Speeches of Henry Lord Brougham upon Questions relating to Public Rights, 
Duties and Interests. Edin. Vol. I., p. 105. There are various readings in the 
original report of this speech ; some phrases run as given here. 8 
The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
fessional repute, no words can express. For his endeavors to 
mitigate or turn aside the execration sure to overtake it when 
the facts are fully known, we believe that Dr. Keen will one 
day experience the bitterest regret. 
For plainness of speech or emphasis of denunciation we 
shall offer no apology; the subject requires it. Again and 
again, as a method of defense, Dr. Keen has insinuated against 
the American Humane Association, charges of literary dis- 
honesty, the utter falsity of some of which-as we shall 
demonstrate,-he must have known. Such methods of criti- 
cism demand plain speech. We shall utter no words that 
have not truth for their basis; we shall demonstrate, rather 
than assert; we shall be fair and just, but there shall be no 
cause on the part of human vivisectors or their apologists 
to complain that our meaning is vague or obscure. 
We desire to do Dr. Keen no injustice in the criticisms we 
propose to make. He will doubtless protest loudly that he 
sufficiently voiced his condemnation of the practice in that 
reply to Senator Gallinger, which we have just quoted. But such 
words of vague reprehension unaccompanied as they were, by 
one word of specific reproof,-resemble precisely the denuncia- 
tions of that prudent Puritan, who preached most vigorously 
against " the exceeding sinfulness of Sin." Such condemna- 
tion touches the sensibilities of no offender. One by one, in 
careful examination of details Dr. Keen has weighed some of 
the worst conceivable experiments upon women and children, 
related in the pamphlet Human Vivisection ; but which experi- 
menter of them all has he dared to denounce? Not one has 
he named, or even referred to, in any such way as would tend 
to hinder the man from grasping his hand in gratitude and 
tacit appreciation. No reader of Dr. Keen's paper can doubt 
for a moment where his sympathies lie. No " condemnation " 
of his, which mingles one word of mild disapprobation with a 
thousand of strenuous defense, is of the slightest weight. 
No "condemnation" has value which refers to crime with 
apology, and mentions criminals with respect. 
In attempting to nullify the disclosures regarding Hospital 
experimentation made by the American Humane Association 
in the pamphlet on Human Vivisection, Dr. Keen has directed The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
9 
his attack along various lines. We propose to follow him and 
to consider these points: 
I. The question of vague and indefinite quota- 
tion. Were many of the experiments narrated in the 
pamphlet so vague and indefinite that Dr. Keen could 
not verify them ? 
II. The question of garbled quotations. Brevity of 
quotation is often absolutely necessary. Were omissions 
made by the pamphlet of vital importance for determin- 
ing the morality of the acts condemned, or were they, 
on the contrary, non-essential to any such judgment ? 
III. The question of controversial ethics. Has Hu- 
man Vivisection been defended or palliated by resort to 
false suggestion ? 
These are practically the points at issue. We shall prove 
that " many of the experiments narrated in the pamphlet " 
were not so vague or indefinite that they could not be 
"looked up that although some mistakes were made by 
translators or copyists, they would not change condemnation 
into approval; and finally that to palliate the offenses of 
human vivisectors, resort has been made to the suggestion of 
inferences manifestly untrue. 
I. 
The Question of Vague Quotation. 
i. In his reply to Senator Gallinger, before quoted, Dr. 
Keen declared regarding the experiments narrated in that 
pamphlet that many "are so vague and indefinite that I could 
not look them up." In other words, regarding " many of the 
experiments" he could not find proof that they had been 
made! That statement was challenged. It was pointed out 
by the President of the American Humane Association that, 
with one exception, every phase of experimentation specifi- 
cally mentioned had some reference to a medical authority. 
Now, how is this issue met by Dr. Keen? 10 
The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
It is met by evasion. Instead of acknowledging his error, 
Dr. Keen, arbitrarily, and without permission of anyone 
changes the issue. " I stated " he says in his reply to Presi- 
dent Brown, " that many of the references were vague and 
indefinite." Absolutely untrue; he stated nothing of the 
kind ; we quoted his words at the outset precisely as they 
stand-revised by himself,-in the Report of the Hearing. 
Does he claim that they mean the same thing? Then why 
did he change them? It is easy to see. 
Let us take as a first illustration of what Dr. Keen means 
by vagueness, the horrible "cancer-grafting" cases of cer- 
tain European surgeons, to which this pamphlet first directed 
attention on this side of the Atlantic. To a hospital in France 
a poor woman was brought one day suffering from cancer of the 
breast. An operation was necessary ; she consented, and was 
put under the influence of chloroform. After the operation, 
and while the patient was still unconscious from effect of the 
anaesthetic, the operating surgeon, Dr. Doyen, carefully in- 
serted a bit of the cancer he had just removed into the healthy 
breast of the victim. The wound healed ; nothing at first ex- 
cited the patient's apprehension or alarm. Then, some weeks 
after, she found, doubtless to her unspeakable horror and des- 
pair, a new cancer in the opposite breast! And the crime was 
repeated. 
Let us give a brief summary of these two scientific exper- 
iments in Dr. Cornil's own words: (italics ours.) 
" L'operateur, apres avoir enleve cette tumeur, en a sectionne un tres petit 
fragment, et l'a insere sous la peau du sein du cote oppose qui etaitparfaitment 
normal. L'operation avait ete faite pendant le sommeil chloroformique avec les 
precautions antiseptiques." 
The second case was almost exactly the same. 
"Apres 1'ablation du sein malade, et pendant le sommeil chloroformique, le 
chirurgien insera dans le tissu glandulaire du sein du cote oppose, un petit frag- 
ment de la tumeur enlevee. La greffe suivit la meme evolution."* 
When Prof. Cornil read an account of these human vivi- 
sections before the Academy of Medicine in Paris, at the 
meeting of June 23, 1891, the members,-horrified by such 
* Bulletin de I'Academic de Medicine, 1891, p. 906, " Sur les greffes et inocu- 
lations de cancer." The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
11 
disclosures,-hastened to record their deepest condemnation. 
" In the name of French surgery, in the name of morality, I 
cannot too emphatically protest against this experiment," 
exclaimed Dr. Leon Le Fort. " It is surgical immorality," 
cried Dr. Larrey. " It is an essentially criminal act," said 
Dr. Moutard-Martin. Then in the outcry of abhorrence 
that arose throughout Europe, it was discovered that exactly 
similar experiments had not only been made in Germany, 
but-worst of all,-they had been openly described at meetings 
of physicians and surgeons, one of which was the 18th 
Congress of the German Medical Association ! The special 
correspondent of the British Medical Journal, wrote thus 
from Berlin : 
" The question whether a surgeon is justified in inoculating a patient with 
minute particles of cancer is being as much discussed in medical circles in Berlin 
as it is in Paris. A Dr. Leidig-not a medical man but a lawyer,-has, in the 
public press accused Professors Hahn and von Bergmann of having inoculated 
carcinomatous patients with particles of cancer, in places where they were not dis- 
eased and of having thus artificially produced new cancerous foci. In proof of his 
accusation, Dr. Leidig quoted the following passages."* 
One of the proofs brought forward by Dr. Leidig was the 
following extract from the report given by Dr. Hahn of his 
own investigation : 
" Herr E. Hahn glaubt durch ein Experiment die Uebertragbarkeit des Car- 
cinoms erwiesen zu haben. Er hat einer Patientin die an Carcinome dissemine litt 
von drei KnOtchen mit einer Scheere auf Art der Reverdin' schen Transplantation 
Thiele entfernt und an ganz entfernten Stetten implantirt. Alle drei Knotchen 
sind fortgewachsen und haben sick als Carcinome weiter entwickelt."\ 
The correspondent of the British Medical Journal translates 
the above confession of guilt as follows : " Herr E. Hahn be- 
lieves that he has proved by experiment that cancer is trans- 
ferable. He had removed particles of three nodules from a 
female patient suffering from carcinome dissemine with scissors, 
and had implanted them in different spots of the body. All 
three particles increased in size developing in cancer." 
* British Medical Journal, July 25, 1891, p. 214, See also its issue of Aug. 29, 
1891, p. 495. 
f Deutsche med. Wochenschrift, 10 Nov,, 1887, p. 987. 12 
The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
It was the surgical scandal of all Europe. The British 
Medical Journal editorially denounced the French surgeon's 
experiments in cancer-grafting as "an outrage, not only upon 
the unhappy persons referred to, but upon the whole medical 
profession." * The daily press discussed these abominable in- 
vestigations with various expressions of popular abhorrence 
and condemnation. And certainly if any question affects the 
welfare of everyone, it is this. What wife, mother or sister 
undergoing a surgical operation, will be safe, if, while 
unconscious, such "experiments'' may be made, and the 
crime afterward condoned and tacitly justified on the part of 
American surgeons, by all failure to condemn the perpe- 
trators ? 
To this phase of human vivisection the pamphlet devoted 
more space than to any other. Of the occurrence of these in- 
famous deeds, Dr. Keen, as an educated surgeon, could have 
had no more doubt than he has of the late outbreak in China, 
regarding which, we dare say, his only source of information is 
that daily press, which he holds so greatly in contempt. 
Granted that the charge is true, how can he ward it off? 
Does he denounce these criminals ? Does he join the leading 
surgeons of France in stigmatizing these acts as " surgical im- 
morality," and as " essentially immoral ? " No. Not one word 
of censure escapes him. But looking closely, he discovers that 
certain quotations from editorials in German newspapers refer- 
ring to this scandal of the day are without exact dates ; he 
finds, too, that Dr. Leidig's accusation has no date, (although 
it was referred to by the British Medical Journal in a passage 
just quoted, equally without such specification), and forthwith 
Dr. Keen holds up these trifles in such way as to convey the 
impression that the whole charge rests upon anonymous news- 
papers ! Of five " references " which Dr. Keen declares were 
impossible of consultation, four were nothing but editorial ex- 
pressions of opinion upon occurrences which were vouched for 
by medical references, which were of notoriety throughout 
Europe, and of the occurrence of which he had no more doubt 
than he has of the battle of Bunker Hill ! And yet these 
* British Medical Journal, July 4. 1891, p. 23. A reference to these human 
vivisections was also printed in the Medical Press of London, Dec. 5, 1888 (p.583) The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
13 
comments, these expressions of public opinion upon events 
that were the universal scandal of the time,-comments that 
did not purport to be proofs,-Dr. Keen has the face to bring 
forward in support of his charge that " many (experiments) 
were so vague and indefinite that I could not look them up ! " 
What are we to think of a writer who regards such a trick as 
justifiable, or believes in such methods of advocacy ? In failing 
to condemn the men guilty of these crimes,-eminent sur- 
geons though they may be,-any American surgeon makes a 
terrible mistake. Possibly there may be in this country half 
a dozen persons,-certainly not more,-who dream that 
American women needing a surgeon's aid, would prefer to 
trust themselves to the skill of an operator who has no words 
of condemnation for the perpetrators of the foulest crimes 
upon unconscious womanhood. 
2. Take another illustration of Dr. Keen's proof that many 
experiments were so vague and indefinite he could not look 
them up. The pamphlet on Human Vivisection gives a quota- 
tion from Tertullian, who lived nearly seventeen hundred years 
ago. The quotation certainly had nothing to do with the 
practices of to-day ; it was merely of historical interest. Dr. 
Keen looks for it, and then, referring to the volume to which 
it was credited, boldly asserts, that " no such quotation exists 
on pages 430-433. Now, let us suppose, that some reader 
who does not care to take Dr. Keen's word as infallibly cor- 
rect, concludes to test this assertion. He opens the volume 
referred to at page 430 ; finishes the sentence at foot of the 
page,-and there is the very quotation on the second line of 
page 431, where he cannot possibly help seeing it if he reads 
the page to which it was ascribed !* No reader who takes the 
trouble to consult the volume can doubt that Dr. Keen saw it. 
The temptation, however, to make a printer's error (430, 433, 
instead of 430-433) do service as an imputation of literary dis- 
* Tertullian, De Anima, Edinburgh Edition. Tran, by Holmes. Vol. II, 
pp. 430-433. 
" There is that Herophilus, the well-known surgeon, or (as I may rather 
call him) butcher, who cut up no end of persons in order to investigate the secrets 
of Nature, who ruthlessly handled human creatures to discover their form and 
make." The pamphlet, it is true, used the word "physician " in place of 
" surgeon," but we presume this is hardly an error which would lead Dr. Keen to 
deny existence of the paragraph. 14 
The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
honesty was too strong for him to resist, especially since he 
knew that not one reader in a thousand would ever take the 
trouble to test the veracity of his statements. But how hard 
pressed must be the cause that in defense, resorts to tricks like 
this ! 
3. Regarding Finger's abominable experiments upon 
women who had just passed through the pangs of child-birth, 
the reference in the pamphlet gave the name of the periodical 
and the number, but in some way omitted the year. "No such 
paper by Finger is published in that journal, at least from 1890 
to the present time," cries Dr. Keen,-wisely modifying his 
emphatic statement by a saving clause. The account of these 
experiments, as stated in Hitman Vivisection are to be found in 
the volume for 1885 °f the periodical named. 
We shall again refer to this charge of "vague and indefi- 
nite " experiments when we come to speak of a more serious 
matter. 
II. 
The Question of Garbled Quotations. 
Before touching this question of inaccurate quotation to 
which Dr. Keen has devoted so much research and argument, 
let us ask what the compilers of Human Vivisection 
manifestly aimed to do? Assuredly they did not attempt 
to write a treatise. The extracts were brief, and yet brevity 
was unavoidable. To have printed in full, the papers from 
which these excerpts were taken would have required a large 
volume; the full translation of Menge's articles alone would 
occupy thirty pages the size of this. What the compilers 
evidently sought to do was simply this: to demonstrate by 
a few brief and condensed statements,-taken almost without 
exception from medical sources,-the fact that experimentation 
upon human beings is not a myth, but an auful reality, and that 
both the practice, and the men guilty of it should be emphati- 
cally and impartially condemned. When Dr. Keen, attempt- 
ing to create doubt and confuse judgment, told Senator Gal- 
linger that some experiments were "garbled and inaccurate," 
he was challenged to point out any such suppression of facts 
as would cause him to give approval to the deeds. Every- The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
15 
thing that could possibly tend to mitigate condemnation of 
the perpetrators or throw doubt upon the reality of the deed 
itself, he has suggested or implied in his letter; but that open 
sanction he was invited to give, he has prudently withheld. 
The vilest experimenters he has failed to rebuke, but he dared 
not openly commend them. 
In the title given to his contribution-"Misstatements on 
Antivivisection"-and in various allusions which are scattered 
through it, there is apparently the suggestion that all this 
opposition to hospital experiments upon the ignorant and poor, 
proceeds from antivivisectionists. It is true that the opponents 
of animal experimentation have been strongest in their oppo- 
sition to human vivisection, but there are hundreds who are 
not antivivisectionists, who would most decidedly condemn 
the vivisection of Man. Is it wise, is it expedient, is it accur- 
rate to give the former all the credit of opposition to the vile- 
ness of human vivisection? Can Dr. Keen for a moment fancy 
that the medical profession are united in tacit approval of 
such deeds? There will be a vast increase in the number of 
"antivivisectionists" if all who oppose this atrocity must be 
included in their ranks. 
1. We shall not deny that in his microscopic examination 
of the pamphlet, Dr. Keen has discovered some few errors of 
translators or transcribers, which of course will be corrected in 
any future editions of Human Vivisection. These German 
translations were made by European writers, and considering 
their source, there was every reason for belief in their verbal 
accuracy. For none of them was the American Humane Asso- 
ciation responsible in any way whatever. But the point we 
insist upon is this: that such errors of translation as exist,- 
such liberties with the text involving too liberal translations, 
such abbrieviations or inaccuracies,- pertain to but few cases, 
and do not in the slightest degree change or mitigate the im- 
morality of the experiments themselves. 
2. In one point only has Dr. Keen been able to indicate a 
serious error in the pamphlet criticised. This mistake concerns 
certain experiments made by Dr. Sanarelli upon hospital 
patients under his care, by inoculating them with the poison 
of yellow fever. At the end of a long list of symptoms pro. 16 
The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
duced by the poison in the unfortunate victims, Dr. Sanarelli 
appends the Latin word in italics-" collapsusA* Impressed 
with its emphasis, and its place at the end, the translator, 
doubtless with no objectionable intent-wrote "final collapse," 
where the adjective should have been omitted. It was a 
serious mistake, for it led to a statement by the writer who 
first gave it publicity that it was " understood that some, if 
not all of the persons inoculated died of the disease." The 
translation of this sentence, and the deduction to which it led 
were both given to the public over his own name by Mr. 
Rene Bache of Washington, D. C., a well-known writer on 
scientific subjects, who has no connection whatever with the 
American Humane Whoever made this trans- 
lation, he included one sentence, actually in the original Italian, 
but which was carefully omitted-or "garbled"-in every 
other translation into English which we have been able to 
find in the medical press. Reference will be made again 
to this very singular circumstance. 
3. Dr. Keen's imputation of "garbled quotation" is 
utterly baseless except on the ground that the parts omitted 
in the pamphlet, were essential to any fair judgment of the 
morality of the experimenter's acts. On this question, we 
join issue with him without hesitation. He insists that the 
accounts of certain human vivisections contained in the pamph- 
let, are " garbled,'' because the result of the experi- 
ment-so far as the victim is concerned-was not always 
stated ; and he refers to this omission so often, as to imply 
that he regards non-injury to the victims a substantial ex- 
cuse for the deeds. Sanarelli with his yellow fever venom 
(" veleno ") makes cruel tests upon five hospital patients en- 
trusted to his professional care ; " none of them died]' protests 
Dr. Keen. Fitch of San Francisco, while at Hawaii, inoculates 
some twenty little girls with the virus of foulest disease, under 
circumstances which if Dr. W. W. Keen dared to print and 
publicly to sanction and repeat in Philadelphia to-day, it would 
cause him to be hissed and hooted from the city in which he 
lives. " None of those inoculated took the disease," he pleads in 
* We give the exact words of Dr. Sanarelli on page 29 of this pamphlet. 
fSee the Boston Transcript, September 24, 1897. The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
17 
apparent extenuation of the vileness which he dared not other- 
wise endorse. Wentworth makes experiments upon sick and 
dying children in an " Infants' Hospitaland Dr. Keen hastens 
to mitigate criticism by showing that the death of the little 
ones was due to other causes-all unconscious that his ex- 
cuse is one of the most infamous circumstances of the deed,- 
it was dying children in the last throes of death that were 
sometimes used as " material '' for these human vivisections. 
Berkley makes experiments which he calls " poisoning with 
preparations of the thyroid gland;" it was, he says, "directly 
for the purpose of ascertaining the toxicity " (or poisonous 
qualities) "of one of the best known varieties of the thyroid 
gland, that the following series of experiments were under- 
taken ; " they were made upon "eight patients of the City 
asylum;" two patients became "frenzied" and of these, one 
died ; and Dr. Keen is loud in proclaiming that she died of 
"galloping consumption,"-as if now and by this excuse he had 
cleared the experimenter from every stain of guilt! Schreiber 
experiments upon forty new-born babes ; and Dr. Keen is 
quick to explain, that-according to the experimenter,-no evil 
results were experienced by the victims. Neisser makes a 
series of experiments involving inoculations of so infernal a 
character that their publication has stirred all Germany into 
indignant protest; the London Times recently reports that 
Neisser has been made the subject of judicial investigation, 
and that for merely giving publicity to his diabolical work he 
has been officially censured and heavily fined.* Does Dr. Keen 
find occasion to add his censure? Does he condemn Neisser in 
any way? Does he utter a single word of reprobation? On 
the contrary he rushes forward to defend him by assailing 
* London Times, Saturday, January 5, 1901. To show how the Prussian 
Government regards these Neisser experiments, the special correspondent of the 
London Times, writing from Berlin, January 4, 1901, makes the following state- 
ment, which we commend to the careful attention of Dr. Keen. 
"In obvious connexion with this (Neisser) case, is an order which has just 
been promulgated by the Prussian Minister of Public Instruction. The order says : 
' I hereby call the attention of those who have the management of clinical and 
Polyclinical Hospitalsand similar institutions to the fact that medical operations for 
any purposes save those of the diagnosis, cure and prei ention of disease are for bid- 
din, even when otherwise permissible from the legal and moral point of view,- 
(1) in the case of a person who is a minor, or (who) for other reasons is not 18 
The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
those who had brought his wickedness to light in this country, 
and by assuring us-on the word of Neisser /-that of the girl 
victims (one was but ten years old), some were of irregular 
life ! Now what have all these excuses to do with the essential 
immorality of the experiments or the utter condemnation their 
perpetrators deserve? Does Dr. Keen for one moment believe 
that if he should repeat the investigations of Fitch or 
Neisser by inoculating Philadelphia children with the foulest 
of diseases, he could escape universal execration in that city 
by placing his hand upon his heart and affirming-on his word 
of honor,-that by good fortune they escaped injury, or else 
that some of the girl-victims were of doubtful repute ? He 
knows better. He knows that he would not dare to repeat 
their experiments, and ever hope for pardon from the Amer- 
ican people by the promulgation of such a plea. Then why 
does he bring it up ? Why does he attack the American 
Humane Association for omissions in regard to these experi- 
ments of his friends, which could not in the slightest degree 
mitigate the vileness of their crimes? 
For ourselves, we consider utterly valueless all statements 
concerning the fate of the victims of human vivisection which 
rest upon the unsupported word of the experimenter himself. 
Dr. Keen tells us, for instance, that none of the patients 
experimented upon by Dr. X. died as a result of the experi- 
ments, but from other causes. Well, how do you know ? 
From the evidence. Whose evidence? The word of Dr. X. ! 
Is he then, likely to confess the truth whenever that truth 
would make him liable to a criminal investigation ? When an 
insane patient is choked or kicked to death in Bellevue Hospi. 
entirely responsible ; (2) in cases where the person in question has not explicitly 
given permission for the operation; (3) in cases where this permission has not 
been preceded by a proper statement of the injurious consequences which might 
possibly result from the operation. 
I likewise order that operations of this nature shall be undertaken only by a 
Director of the Institution himself or by his special authorization. Whenever 
such an operation is performed, the register of the case must contain a statement 
that the above conditions have been fulfilled and must also give a detailed account 
of the circumstances. The existing regulations affecting medical operations for 
the purposes of diagnosis, cure or prevention of disease are not affected by these 
instructions."-(London Times. January 5, 1901). The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
19 
tai by his " nurses," does any one expect them to come forward 
and tell how the " unavoidable accident " really occurred ? 
Will not the bruises be ascribed to " a fall," and the broken 
bones to a peculiar osseous friability ? And when a man sinks 
to the moral condition of an experimenter upon human flesh 
and blood, upon little children confided to his care by love 
and solicitude, his report on the after-condition of his victims 
may have some special and peculiar value in the eyes of Dr- 
Keen, but we can assure him, it possesses very little for the 
world at large. We believe that criminals like these n count the 
hits and not the misses,'' as Lord Bacon says ; and that when- 
ever there is good reason to fear consequences, the silence of 
the grave hides forever their crimes. We never know, for a 
certainty, the result of a human vivisection, when an adverse 
report is only to be made by the men guilty of the deed, 
Even when the victims actually and in truth escape the pos- 
sible contingency to which they were subjected, (we repeat it 
emphatically for Dr. Keen's elementary instruction in morals), 
such result does not in the slightest degree mitigate the 
essential wickedness of the experiment, or the criminality of 
that physician or surgeon who can stoop to the commission of 
such infamous acts. 
III. 
Has Human Vivisection been Palliated by Sugges- 
tion of Conclusions Contrary to Fact? 
We come at last to the most serious criticism we have to make 
of Dr. Keen's letter. In defense of such experimentation or 
in palliation of its atrocity, has Dr. Keen repeatedly suggested 
as true, conclusions which were not only without basis of fact, 
but the falsity of which,-if he had stopped to reflect,-he 
must assuredly have known ? Consciously or unconsciously 
has he again and again sacrificed veracity to expediency, in 
anxiety to clear his friends ? We are not imputing to him the 
dishonor of deliberate falsehood. Should he declare with 
uplifted hands that every word he has ever written on points 
hereafter criticised is literally true, we shall not argue the 
matter. We believe, however, that we can indicate so many 
instances of false suggestion, as to prove-from a scientific The Reality* of Human Vivisection. 
20 
standpoint-the utter unreliability of everything he has written 
regarding human vivisection. Some of these instances, alone 
by themselves, might be regarded as of slight significance. 
Taken collectively, they are so many as to denote an inherent 
tendency to inaccuracy in his mental operations, which cannot 
be gainsaid, however it may be explained. We shall refer to 
more than a dozen instances of this " suggestion of the false." 
i. The first instance is less in the very statement made 
before the Senate Committee. " Of experiments narrated 
in that pamphlet," said Dr. Keen, 1 have looked one I 
could. Only two are alleged to have been done in A merica." Only 
" two experiments ? " Why Dr. Wentworth made some forty- 
five experiments on infants and children, some of them in a dying 
condition ; Dr. Berkley tells us that he used " eight human 
subjects;" we call that fifty-three experiments, not "two." 
He affects indignation at " the imputation of untruthfulness," 
and asks President Brown to point out " a third instance of 
experiments done in America," and mentioned in the pamph- 
let. We point to fifty more experiments mentioned in the 
pamphlet than those he asks for, and we say that the im- 
pression conveyed by his language is contrary to facts. 
The truth is, the American Humane Association did not 
wish to make any more exposure of the evil than would prob- 
ably suffice to prove its existance and tend to secure con- 
demnation and reform. It never dreamed that an educated 
and reputable medical man would attempt to minimize such 
facts, or give an impression of his personal ignorance regard- 
ing so notorious an evil. Why, if the American Humane As- 
sociation were merely to quote the accounts of experiments 
made upon charity patients in American hospitals, and on 
record in medical literature, it would give publicity to 
researches, some of which, in deliberate diabolism of invention, 
equal in certain respects the vilest human vivisections of 
Europe ! Will Dr. Keen challenge this statement and assume 
responsibility for the exposures that will then ensue? 
As a suggestive indication of the value of Dr. Keen's 
assumption of ignorance, let us cite here a single fact. At 
the Fifty-first annual meeting of the American Medical Asso- 
ciation, held at Atlantic City, N. J., in June, 1900, a Dr. The Reality of Hitman Vivisection. 
21 
Bernheim, of Philadelphia, presented to one of the Sections 
an account of some twelve experiments he had made upon 
human beings,-six upon a mulatto and six on a " woman 
patient." These researches were not of the worst character ; 
but still they were expressions of tendency toward that 
disregard of human rights which underlies all such experiments 
on the ignorant and poor.* Who was president of the 
American Medical Association at this time? Dr. William W. 
Keen. 
2. Another false suggestion is the use of the word 
"alleged;" certain human vivisections are, he tells us, "alleged 
to have been done." Why did he use a word that implies 
uncertainty where no possible doubt really existed in his 
mind? We do not say the sun is "alleged" to shine; an 
allegation, says Dr. Murray in his great dictionary, is " an 
assertion without proof, a mere assertion." Now Dr. Keen 
had not the slightest doubt of the Wentworth-Berkley experi- 
ments, for he had read the original accounts in the medical 
journals containing them. To speak of their occurrence as 
" alleged " could only have been done in order to suggest a 
doubt where he knew none to exist. 
3. In his letter to the President of the Humane Associ- 
ation Dr. Keen, says : "You depend for the accuracy of your 
statements upon newspapers as follows: " and he prints a long 
list of journals to many of which merely passing reference had 
been made,-entirely suppressing all mention of the medical 
books or journals upon whose evidence the compilers of the 
pamphlet relied. He knew perfectly well that these news- 
papers were not the basis upon which the charges of experi- 
mentation rested, but he knew, too, that nine out of ten readers 
would never take the trouble to test his statement, and would 
believe-on his word,-that the proofs of such experimenta- 
tion rested on vague newspaper report. The cancer-grafting 
experiments to which we have before alluded, were instances 
of this trickery. Was it honorable to convey impressions so 
void of truth ? 
* Journal of the American Medical Association, F'ebruary 16, igoi. p. 429. 
In the same issue of this periodical is an account of certain experiments made 
regarding yellow fever, upon men who were hired to submit to the investigations. 
See pp. 431,447, 461. 22 
The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
4. Upon a small pamphlet, or tract, (printed, Dr. Keen 
tells us in Washington, D. C.) he expends a certain measure of 
criticism. Having never seen it, we do not know whether his 
imputations concerning it are well-founded or not. But 
whatever its defects, what have they to do with the publica- 
tion of the Humane Association ? Nothing whatever. And 
yet Dr. Keen joins both pamphlets in one criticism,-even 
numbering his paragraphs as if both publications proceeded 
from the same source! He knew better. Why was it done? 
Simply to lengthen his letter, and somehow to give to the 
public an idea of responsibility for errors where he knew 
there was none. Was it honest ? Was it anything else but a 
" suggestion of the false? " 
5. Still another instance is found in Dr. Keen's enumer- 
ation of his " evidences." After giving names of fourteen 
newspapers and journals, he remarks : " I now add six other 
' vague and indefinite references ' not to newspapers ; " and he 
begins by referring to Tertullian (upon which we have already 
commented) numbering this paragraph " 15," and so on up to 
"20." His meaning is clear; he desires his readers to believe 
that he has named fourteen instances of "vague and indefi- 
nite " authorities,-and that he then added " six other vague 
and indefinite references" making twenty in all. Not one 
reader in ten would perceive that this conclusion was wholly 
false. He has not named 14 " vague and indefinite " refer- 
ences, and he does not add " six more." Of the fourteen 
journals referred to, every one conveying a statement of fact- 
save one,-had its name and date of publication plainly given ; 
we read them in Dr. Keen's own list; one for example was the 
London Times of June 27, 1891. To call such references 
"vague and indefinite" is to state what is absurdly untrue. 
Of the " six other vague and indefinite references," which Dr. 
Keen then claims to add to his list, two were taken from the 
Washington publication which Dr. Keen knew perfectly well 
had nothing to do with the pamphlet he was pretending to 
review. What kind of principles are they which sanction 
trickery like this? If done by some " newspaper writer,"-for 
whom he has so profound a contempt,-would Dr. Keen call 
it anything but downright literary dishonesty ? The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
23 
6. Referring to Dr. Berkley's well-known experiments on 
insane patients, Dr. Keen approaches as nearly to positive 
approval of them as language could well imply. One passage 
in his letter is as follows : 
" Moreover, the pamphlet states, that ' there is no intimation that the 
administration of the poisonous substance was given for any beneficial purpose to 
the patients, for he took care to select patients that were probably incurable.' On 
the contrary, Berkley's original paper expressly states that instead of being incur- 
able ones (Case No. i) was cured, and another (No. 3) was improved." (Italics 
ours). 
Did Berkley select patients that zvere probably incurable ? 
Dr. Keen says, "on the contrary,"-suggesting that Berkley 
did nothing of the kind. Let us see just what Berkley him- 
self said in his original article. 
" The first part of the investigation was made upon eight patients at the City 
Asylum, who, with one exception (No. 1), had either passed, or were about to pass, 
the limit of the time in which the recovery could be confidently expected." (Italics 
ours). 
If language like this means anything, it means that the 
patients "with one exception" were not likely to recover. 
Does Dr. Keen's "on the contrary " suggest this? 
7. Dr. Keen asserts that "as a result of the administra- 
tion of the thyroid tablets to these eight patients, . . . two 
of these alleged ' incurables ' were cured-25 per cent." 
This is a suggestion of false conclusions of the most pal- 
pable kind. In his original paper, Berkley made no pretense 
of "curing'' Case No. 3. He states that this patient at the 
outset was " good tempered," and weighed " at beginning of 
the thyroid administration 125 pounds." After fifteen 
days of the drug " he was so quarrelsome it was necessary 
to restrain him," and this was accompanied by other unpleasant 
symptoms. "The administration of the extract being now dis- 
continued, he regained weight, became more quiet, and after the 
lapse of several weeks he was sent to his friends somewhat 
improved." In other words, his course was downward until 
the drug was discontinued, and only after the lapse of weeks 
was he "somewhat improved!" When Dr. Keen included this 
case as one that was cured " as a result of the administration 
of the thyroid tablets'' did he suggest the truth? The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
24 
This is the way Dr. Berkley himself speaks of these 
" cures," and the " treatment " generally : 
" The above experiment upon eight human subjects points ont conclusively that 
the administration of even the very best and purest of the commercial dessicated 
thyroid tablets is not unattended by danger to the health and life of the patient." 
(Italics ours). 
We commend this wise conclusion to the consideration of 
those patients of Dr. Keen to whom, he tells us, he has given 
such tablets for weeks together in larger doses than Dr. Berk- 
ley used." Did they know that their treatment was " not un- 
attended by danger to the health and life of the patient ? " 
8. Still another instance may be found in an " ADDEN- 
DUM " to Dr. Keen's letter, wherein he compares the case of 
a cretin child, treated by the thyroid extract in a perfectly 
proper way, with Berkley's experiments upon the Insane. 
Dr. Keen knows quite well that the two cases are entirely dis- 
tinct ; the purpose of one was the cure of the patient ; the 
admitted purpose of the other was to test the toxicity of a 
drug ; but he couples them together as if they were alike in 
all respects. He says distinctly : " If Dr. Berkley s use of the 
thyroid extract, which cured two out of eight patients was an 
experiment, and its administration by Dr. Nicholson also was 
an experiment, the more of such happy ' experiments' we could 
have the better." (Italics ours). 
Here, within the compass of less than forty words we have 
three false suggestions. He intimates that the perfectly proper 
use of the thyroid extract by Dr. Nicholson has been called 
an ' experiment,' which is untrue ; he asserts the " cure " 
of two of Berkley's patients, and he ridicules the idea that any 
experimentation took place. We have tested the veracity of 
one suggestion ; let us see what degree of truth is in another. 
Was Berkley's administration of the thyroid extract in 
the nature of regular medical treatment, or was it 
experimental in character, having for its " purpose," the test- 
ing of the " toxicity'' of a dangerous drug? The answer to 
this inquiry is not to be gained by quotations from Berkley's 
recent defense, but by noting his expressions of " purpose " in 
the original article, when he had no expectation of any criti- 
cism. The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
25 
In the first paragraph of his essay, Dr. Berkley shows his 
scepticism regarding the drug as a " medicament." He says: 
" The favorable side of the administration of the thyroid extracts is shown in 
the very numerous articles in current medical literature published both in this 
country and in Europe, . . It is quite safe to say after a review of some of them 
that the results would have been as brilliant had no medicament been administered. 
It is nevertheless true that the extract, tvhen administered to either man or the 
lotver animals, will occasion very grave symptoms of a toxemic (poisonous) nature ; 
symptoms that involve the cerebral, the vasomotor, and digestive functions ; and 
perhaps, also, the normal action of those ductless glands that throw into the circu- 
lation a potent, though unknown, substance ; and when this administration is 
pushed to even a moderate degree, death is almost the invariable result. 
A medicament having these qualities cannot, therefore, be administered with im- 
punity to every sane or insane patient; and it was therefore directly for the pur- 
pose of ascertaining the toxicity (poisonous qualities) of one of the best known 
varieties of the thyroid extract that the following series of experiments was under- 
taken. The first portion of the investigation was made upon eight patients at the 
City Asylum, who, with one exception (No. 1), had passed or were about to pass 
the limit of time in which a recovery could be confidently expected.' * (Italics 
ours). 
" If this was an experiment ! " " The more of such happy 
experiments the better ! " We wonder whether Dr. Keen's 
patients share his enthusiasm for this sort of happy experi- 
ments upon themselves ? 
9. But there are phases of defense of far more serious 
import. It is not easy to imagine a physician whose con- 
science is so touched with atrophy that he can consent to 
palliate Human Vivisection even by accurate statements of 
what he may consider its scientific utility. When, however, 
we find one not merely excusing the infamy, but suggesting 
excuses, the untruth of which he is certainly aware, then, 
indeed we feel that the limitations of permissible advocacy 
have been more than reached. 
Take the case of Schreiber's victim, as related in the pam- 
phlet,-the little boy whose mother was ill with consumption 
but who, himself was apparently sound and healthy. 
At first the parents refused to permit their child to be inocu- 
lated as an experiment ("anfangs wolten die Eltern die injec- 
tion nicht zulassen,") but at last, after what persuasions we 
* Bulletin of John Hopkins Hospital, July, 1897. Poisoning with prepara- 
tions of the Thyroid Gland," by Henry J. Berkley, M.D. 26 
The Reality of Human Vivisectiqyi 
can never know, they were induced to grant it as a punish- 
ment for some trifling offense, and it produced the reaction 
looked for. Concerning this experiment Dr. Keen, of course, 
has a good word: 
" I do not know what could have been more fortunate for this boy than the 
recognition in its incipiency of a disease previously unsuspected, and which, recog- 
nized thus early, should in all probability be cured by proper treatment. 1 his 
tuberculin test is constantly employed to prevent the spread of tuberculosis in 
our cattle. In our children, it enables us to discover the same disease in an early, 
curable stage. Shall we care for our cattle better than our children? 
As an example of the art of false suggestion, this paragraph 
is a masterpiece. In the most dextrous manner possible the 
reader is invited to believe that what Schreiber intended as 
an experiment was very proper treatment ; that tuberculin, 
as a test for incipient consumption is as suitable for children 
as it is for cattle; that it is so regarded and so employed by 
the medical profession in their general practice; that to decline 
using it to discover consumption "in an early, curable stage," 
is to " care for our cattle better than our children." And yet 
every one of these deductions would be false. Dr. Keen 
knows perfectly well, in the first place, that phthisis, however 
early discovered, is not " in all probability, a curable ailment. 
He knows that the tuberculin test, so often used upon 
apparently sound and healthy cattle, is not sanctioned by the 
medical profession for use upon apparently sound and healthy 
children. He neglects to tell us, as a matter of no account, 
that of the three experiments made by Anders, one of the 
victims died six weeks afterwards. He knows that experi- 
ments like those of Schreiber, made upon apparently healthy 
children of poor consumptive mothers, he would not venture 
to repeat openly upon the apparently sound and healthy 
children of a consumptive mother in any family of wealth and 
influence in the city of Philadelphia; and that if such a test 
were made at all, it would be-as Schreiber made it-where 
persuasion counts, and ignorance veils results. And yet 
knowing all this, he has the supreme audacity to put a ques- 
tion implying the recognized use of tuberculin upon children 
who seem perfectly sound and well:-" Shall we care for our 
cattle better than for our children?" The Reality of Hitman Vivisection. 
27 
10. For Schreiber's experiments upon 40 new-born babes 
by injecting tuberculin in increasing doses, we know in ad- 
vance that Dr. Keen will try to discover some palliating ex- 
cuse. In this case, however, none is apparent, and he there- 
fore impudently intimates that the justification existed but 
that the pamphlet suppressed it. " It would be too much to 
expect your Society to have indicated on what grounds Pro- 
fessor Schreiber was led to the employment of such large 
doses," deftly suggesting-without any positive affirmation- 
that Schreiber knew in advance that his experiments would be 
harmless. Now Dr. Keen knew perfectly well that in this 
suggestion there was not a word of truth, and we shall prove it 
by Schreiber himself. So far from being confident that his ex- 
periments were harmless, Schreiber after beginning them could 
not sleep for thinking of what he had done, and its possible con- 
sequences to these new-born babes. " I spent," he says, " an 
almost sleepless night. Before me I seemed to see the poor babes 
with crimson cheeks and violently-increasing temperature ; 
their wailings I seemed to hear." * It is true that,-taking 
Schreiber's word for it,-these forebodings were unrealized, 
and he went on to repeat the inoculations with constantly in- 
creasing doses. Dr. Keen has no word of censure ; apparently 
he would have us infer it was all right. Would he be willing 
to have thus experimented upon at the hour of its birth, one 
of his own children ? Does he fancy that in the sight of 
the Creator, a hospital-babe is less sacred than his own favored 
offspring ? Because it is poor and friendless, has it no rights ? 
What, we wonder, does Dr. Keen think would have 
been the judgment, upon these experiments, of Him whose 
birthplace was only a manger, and who sometimes had not 
where to lay His head? 
11. This perverse instinct of inveracity crops out every- 
where: it infects even a simple statement of fact. For in- 
stance, in referring to Sanarelli's inoculations of hospital 
patients with the toxin of yellow fever Dr. Keen sees a chance 
* " Die erste Nacht danach habe ich fast schlaflos zugebracht ; ich sah im voraus 
die armen Kinder schon mit hochrothen Wangen und gewalliger Temperatursteiger- 
ung vor mich ; ich glaubte sie wimmern zu horen, u. s. w. von alierdem war 
nichts."-Deut. Med. Wochenschrift, Feb. 19, 1891. 28 
The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
to confuse the impression, and straightway informs his readers 
-as if it were of the utmost importance,-that the pamphlet 
omitted to state that 
" Not the germs of the disease, but the carefully filtered and sterilized germ- 
free fluid was used." 
Really ? Is it not perfectly evident what inference Dr. 
Keen wishes here to suggest? Could any reader unfamiliar 
with the subject imagine that this " carefully-filtered and 
sterilized germ-free fluid " was as a matter of fact one of the 
most virulent of poisons ? Sanarelli tells us that certain experi- 
ments on animals led him to suspect " the existence of a very 
active specific poison. This poison is obtained by simply filter- 
ing the broth culture of bacillus icteroides, 24 days old."* But 
Dr. Keen tells it that it is not only "germ-free," but " steril- 
ized why is that done? Because, Sanarelli tells us, "if 
cultures sterilized with ether are employed, the toxic {poison- 
ing} power is much more active." How thankful we should be 
to Dr. Keen for his little contributions to popular science ! 
How great is the art that can pervert the judgment by the 
statement of a fact I 
12. We come'now to one of the most serious charges we 
have to make. In its reference to Sanarelli's experiments, the 
pamphlet on HUMAN VIVISECTION gave as authority for the fact 
that such experiments had been made, the British Medical 
Journal, quoting also a single sentence from the New Eng- 
land Medical Monthly. Although there is nothing of the kind 
mentioned in the pamphlet, Dr. Keen will have it that " the 
extracts marked with quotation marks are from the New Eng- 
land Medical Monthly f having evolved this from his inner 
consciousness, he goes on, as a matter of course, to complain 
that in certain respects the quoted matter does not verbally 
agree with the source to which he has arbitrarily ascribed it. 
The truth is, that the pamphlet nowhere ascribes the quota- 
tion he criticises to the New England Medical Monthly; it 
distinctly prefixes to this citation the words, " Sanarelli himself 
says:" and the translation which follows was from other 
sources. 
* British Medical Journal, July 3, 1897. The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
29 
But worse is to come. Dr. Keen says : 
" Moreover, the end of the quotation is as follows :-' I have seen [the symp- 
toms of yellow fever] unrolled before my eyes, thanks to the potent influence of 
the yellow fever poison made in my laboratory.' This entire sentence does not 
occur either in the British Medical Journal or in the New England Medical 
Monthly. Whether it is quoted from some other source not indicated, or has been 
deliberately added, I leave you ... to explain." 
We propose to speak with great plainness in regard to this 
paragraph, and the disgraceful imputation which Dr. Keen has 
therein put forth. 
In the first place, this most cold-blooded sentence, (refer- 
ring to the " yellow fever poison made in my laboratory," and 
the long list of symptoms " unrolled before my eyes)," which 
Dr. Keen cannot find in the medical journals named, zuas in 
Sanarelli's own words. We give them in the original Italian, 
transcribed from the volume to which Dr. Keen himself refers 
us.* 
" La febbre, le congestion!, le emorragie, il vomito, la steatosi del fegato, la 
cefalalgia, la rachialgia, la nefrite, 1'anuria, 1'uremia, 1'ittero, il delirio, il collapsus 
-infine, tutto quel complesso di dementi sintomatici ed anatomici, che nel loro 
apprezamento combinato constituiscono la base indivisible della diagnosi di febbre 
gialla, noi l abbiamo visto svolgersi ai nostri occhi,-dovuto alia potente influenza 
del veleno amarilligeno fabricato nelle nostri culture artiflciali." 
There are the words, translated and given to the world by 
the pamphlet on Human Vivisection, but garbled and sup- 
pressed by every medical publication in England or America ! 
True indeed it is, that when men attempt to defend an infamy, 
"either the moral sense is blunted, or the truth-telling faculty 
is in abeyance."'!' 
But we have not finished with Dr. Keen. When he made 
the imputation that because these words were not in certain 
* Annali d' Igiene Sperimentale, 1897. Vol. VII., p. 470. 
f This garbling of Sanarelli's words was probably made by some one con- 
nected with the British Medical Journal, for the first appearance of the mutilated 
sentence was in this periodteal,July 3, 1897. It read thus : 
" The fever, the congestions, . . . delirium, collapse ; in short, all that 
complex of symptomatic and anatomical elements which in their combination, consti- 
tute the indivisible basis of the diagnosis of yellow fever." t 
Any educated reader must see at once that this sentence is imperfect and in- 
complete ; where is the verb ? Did it not occur to Dr. Keen, that only as printed 
in the pamphlet Human Vivisection, could the sentence be said to be grammatic- 
ally correct ? The reason for this garbling is of course evident : it was too plain a 
confession of human vivisection. 30 
The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
medical journals, they were perhaps "deliberately added" by 
his opponents, was he not perfectly aware that Sanarelli him- 
self wrote them? Dr. Keen refers us to the very article of 
Sanarelli, from which we have just quoted them; he consulted 
its many pages most carefully in order to ascertain the alleged 
fate of the five patients upon which the experiments were 
made. Did he not see this sentence there? With the volume 
in his hands, the original article open before his eyes, would 
he have us believe that he did not take the trouble to compare 
and verify the only quotation from it which appears in the pam- 
phlet ? He did not see it? Credat Judceus Apella ! There 
are limitations to credulity. But how queer must be that sense 
of honor which would permit a man to make a disgraceful 
imputation, knowing all the while that every word of it 
was false! 
We have by no means touched upon all that is worthy 
of criticism in this remarkable letter. We have sufficiently 
demonstrated its innate unreliability, its unfairness, its fre- 
quent paltering with truth. It is astonishing that one occu- 
pying Dr. Keen's position in the medical profession should so 
completely fail to comprehend the intensity of protest and 
indignation sure one day to be evoked regarding all who 
either practice or defend these atrocious and execrable 
experiments upon their fellow-men. But the most signifi- 
cant point of all, seems to us that entire absence of any sympa- 
thy for the victims which marks his communication. Every- 
thing is set forth that could help in any way to turn aside 
criticism regarding the experimenters; could not Dr. Keen 
have spared as well, a few words of pity for those who were 
the victims of so called "research?" He is inclined to make 
merry over " scientific assassination that did not assassinate, 
and murder of those who were so disobliging as still to live! " 
It strikes us that this tone of levity is decidedly out of place. 
How does Dr. Keen know that the victims of Sanarelli are 
still alive? These experiments on hospital patients,-for 
which Dr. Keen has here no word of censure,-may not have 
lacked in the end, the death of the victim to complete the 
tragedy. Reading Sanarelli's own account of the agonies 
endured by his victims, the " violenta cefalalgiaf the "dolori The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
31 
lancinanti," the "tenismo spasmodical the" vomito incoercibile," 
the "viva lamentazioni," we are quite sure that the Hospital 
of San Sebastian was no place for mirth. Nor was the final 
result of these experiments so innocent as their apologist 
would have us believe. If a child of Dr. Keen were thus 
unconsciously inoculated with "the carefully filtered and 
sterilized germ-free" toxin of yellow fever, and made to suffer 
day after day all the torments that Sanarelli has so vividly 
described; and if, after the fever had abated, a few " explora- 
tive punctures" were made in his liver and kidneys, "(vane 
punture esplorative dal fegato e dai reni"} revealing a pro- 
found fatty degeneration of the one and granular degeneration 
in the other, we are inclined to think that such endowment 
of his offspring with the beginnings of organic disease and the 
probabilities of shortened life would be regarded as "scientific 
assassination ''even by the man who now scoffs at the phrase.* 
No, Dr. Keen ; by the side of these wan and wasted victims, 
there is. no occasion for your sarcasm, no place for your 
taunts. Rather were it fitting that in sackcloth and ashes, in 
humiliation and remorse, you laid hands on your lips and your 
forehead in the dust, remembering with shame that when the 
infamies of human vivisectors were unveiled, and men called 
in the name of Humanity for their condemnation, your voice 
was silent, and your lips at last opened only for vague and 
glittering generalities of reproof, for ridicule of charges you 
knew were substantially true, for defense even of the vivisec- 
tors of children, in palliation of the vilest crimes. 
Yet we are not hopeless of the future. Centuries ago, to 
one who had stood by dying men, " consenting unto their 
death," there came at last a voice that he could not but heed, 
and a light that " suddenly shining round about him," smote 
him, blinded, to the earth. Perchance to others may yet come 
some journey to Damascus, the light of rebuke and warning, 
the lesson of penitence and expiation. O Divine Justice! 
Thou that tarrying long, yet sleepest not nor slumberest, 
Power not ourselves that makes for Righteousness,-hear our 
prayer! For the sake of infants yet unborn, for whom 
*"Una profunda degenerazione grassa di tutte le cellule epatiche," etc. 
"Annali d Igiene Spermentale," vol. vii., p. 445.  The Reality of Human Vivisection. 
32 
some Menge or Schreiber in his laboratory, waits,-for the 
sake of innocent girlhood and sacred motherhood, not yet 
stretched upon the altar of a God-less science,-for the sake 
of our poor, outraged, common humanity,-grant that all zvho 
practice or uphold these deeds of shame, all zvho encourage 
and defend these criminals, may soon be touched zvith sincerest 
repentance, or meet some just and redeeming retribution,-even 
though it come zvith keen, and bitter, and life-long remorse.