d perhaps teaches) the anatomy of the carotid artery and jugular
vein; and there can be no question that the burning of St. Joan of Arc
must have been a most instructive and interesting experiment to a good
observer, and could have been made more so if it had been carried out by
skilled physiologists under laboratory conditions. The earthquake in San
Francisco proved invaluable as an experiment in the stability of giant
steel buildings; and the ramming of the Victoria by the Camperdown
settled doubtful points of the greatest importance in naval warfare.
According to vivisectionist logic our builders would be justified in
producing artificial earthquakes with dynamite, and our admirals in
contriving catastrophes at naval manoeuvres, in order to follow up the
line of research thus accidentally discovered.

The truth is, if the acquisition of knowledge justifies every sort of
conduct, it justifies any sort of conduct, from the illumination
of Nero's feasts by burning human beings alive (another interesting
experiment) to the simplest act of kindness. And in the light of that
truth it is clear that the exemption of the pursuit of knowledge
from the laws of honor is the most hideous conceivable enlargement of
anarchy; worse, by far, than an exemption of the pursuit of money or
political power, since there can hardly be attained without some regard
for at least the appearances of human welfare, whereas a curious devil
might destroy the whole race in torment, acquiring knowledge all the
time from his highly interesting experiment. There is more danger in one
respectable scientist countenancing such a monstrous claim than in fifty
assassins or dynamitards. The man who makes it is ethically imbecile;
and whoever imagines that it is a scientific claim has not the faintest
conception of what science means. The paths to knowledge are countless.
One of these paths is a path through darkness, secrecy, and cruelty.
When a man deliberately turns from all other paths and goes down that
one, it is scientific to infer that what attracts him is not knowledge,
since there are other paths to that, but cruelty. With so strong and
scientific a case against him, it is childish for him to stand on
his honor and reputation and high character and the credit of a noble
profession and so forth: he must clear himself either by reason or by
experiment, unless he boldly contends that evolution has retained
a passion of cruelty in man just because it is