od who loveth us,
He made and loveth all.

THE TEMPTATION.

+We are tempted to forget this sensitive nature of the animal, and to
treat it as a mere thing.+--We have a perfect right to sacrifice the
pleasure of an animal to the welfare of ourselves. We have no right to
sacrifice the welfare of the animal to our capricious feelings. We have
no right to neglect an animal from sheer unwillingness to give it the
reasonable attention which is necessary to provide it with proper food,
proper care, proper shelter, and proper exercise. A little girl,
reproved for neglecting to feed her rabbits, when asked indignantly by
her father, "Don't you love your rabbits?" replied, "Yes, I love them
better than I love to feed them." This love which doesn't love to feed
is sentimentality, the fundamental vice of all personal relations, of
which we shall hear more later. The temptation arises even here in our
relations to the animal. It is always so much easier to neglect a claim
made upon us from without, than to realize and respect it.

THE VICE OF DEFECT.

+Ignorant or willful disregard of the nature and welfare of an animal is
cruelty.+--Overloading beasts of burden; driving them when lame; keeping
them on insufficient food, or in dark, cold, and unhealthy quarters;
whipping, goading, and beating them constantly and excessively are the
most common forms of cruelty to animals. Pulling flies to pieces,
stoning frogs, robbing birds' nests are forms of cruelty of which young
children are often guilty before they are old enough to reflect that
their sport is purchased at the cost of frightful pain to these poor
innocent and defenseless creatures. The simple fact that we are strong
and they are weak ought to make evident, to anyone capable of the least
reflection, how mean a thing it is to take advantage of our superior
strength and knowledge to inflict pain on one of these creatures which
nature has placed under the protection of our superior power and
knowledge, and lead us to resolve

Never to blend our pleasure or our pride
With sorrow of the meanest thing that feels.

THE VICE OF EXCESS.

+Subjection to animals degrading.+--The animals are vastly inferior to
man in dignity and worth. Many of them have strong wills of their own,
and if we will allow it, will run over us, and have their own way in
spite of us. Such subjection of a man or woman to an animal is a most
shameful sight. To have dominion over them i