painless.WhenSchopenhauerandBenthamwrote,slaughter
wasanevenmorehorrificaffairthanitistoday.Theanimals
were forced to cover long distances on foot, driven to
slaughterbydroverswhohadnoconcernbuttocompletethe
journeyasquicklyaspossible;theymightthenspendtwoor
three days in the slaughteryards, without food, perhaps
without water; they were then slaughtered by barbaric
methods,withoutanyformofpriorstunning.^48 Despitewhat
Bentham says,theydid havesomeform ofanticipation of
what was in store for
them,atleastfrom thetimetheyenteredtheslaughteryard
and smelled the blood of their fellows. Bentham and
Schopenhauerwouldnot, ofcourse,haveapprovedofthis,
yettheycontinued tosupporttheprocessbyconsumingits
products,andjustifyingthegeneralpracticeofwhichitwas
part.InthisrespectPaleyseemstohavehadamoreaccurate
conception of what was involved in eating flesh. He,
however,couldsafelylookthefactsintheface,becausehe
haddivinepermissiontofallbackupon;Schopenhauerand
Benthamcouldnot haveavailedthemselvesofthis excuse,
and so had to turn their gaze away from the ugly reality.
AsforDarwinhimself,hetooretainedthemoralattitudesto
animalsofearliergenerations,thoughhehaddemolishedthe
intellectual foundationsof those attitudes.He continued to
dine onthe flesh of those beings who, he had said, were
capableoflove,memory,curiosity,reason,andsympathyfor
each other; and he refused to sign a petition urging the
RSPCA to press for legislative control of experiments on
animals.^49 Hisfollowerswentoutoftheirwaytoemphasize
thatalthoughwewereapartofnatureanddescendedfrom
animals, our status had not been altered. In reply to the