Who that has witnessed the
barbarous and unmanly sports of the cock-pit and the stake--the
fiendlike ingenuity displayed by the lord of the creation in teaching
his dependents to torture, mangle, and destroy each other for his own
amusement--the cruelties of the greedy and savage task-master towards
the dumb labourer whose strength has decayed in his service--or the
sufferings of the helpless brute that drags with pain and difficulty its
maimed carcass to Smithfield--what reasonable being that has witnessed
all or any of this, will venture to affirm that interference is
officious and uncalled for? Yet it is certain that Mr. Martin acted
properly and wisely in excluding flies from the operation of his
act--well knowing, as he must have done, that the feeling of the
majority was decidedly averse from affording parliamentary countenance
and immunity to those descendants of the victims of Domitian's just
indignation; although it is understood that such a provision would have
been cordially supported by the advocates for universal toleration. The
simple question for consideration would be, whether the conduct and
principles of the insect species have undergone such a material change
as to entitle them to new and extraordinary enactments in their favour?
Have they entirely divested themselves of their licentious and predatory
habits, and learnt now for the first time to distinguish between right
and wrong? Do they understand what it is to commit sacrilege? To intrude
into the sanctum sanctorum of the meat-safe? To rifle and defile the
half roseate, half lily-white charms of a virgin ham? To touch with
unhallowed proboscis the immaculate lip of beauty, the unprotected scalp
of old age, the savoury glories of the kitchen? To invade with the most
reckless indifference, and the most wanton malice, the siesta of the
alderman or the philosopher? To this we answer in the eloquent and
emphatic language of the late Mr.
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