( 41 )
¬open to the light of nature and of truth, he ad- mitted at once all my principles, deplored their imperfect laws which had blindfolded and bru- talized their people, adding, that since the period of rejecting their proposed amendment, the most harmless animals had not only been wan- tonly destroyed, whose mangled carcasses were to be seen daily in the streets, but that savage cruelties to the human species, and even the most atrocious murders, had filled the calendars of their tribunals beyond the example of any former times. I was not surprized at this me- lancholy communication ; the truth is, that laws and laws alo?ie, are capable of forming and fashioning a people — Divine commands are nothing except as they are engrafted upon our system, and we ourselves should be just as little protected against violence from each other, but by the most penal consequences, enforced too by parental warnings to avoid them. — From not extending corrections for the protection of ani- mals, in cases at least of gross and malignant oppression, children are almost universally cruel, ¬and ¬
