(4) Beyond the boundaries of blood and friendship lie a whole hierarchy of lesser relationships-to neighbors, to employees, to fellow townsmen, to human beings the world over.  Mere proximity constitutes a claim that is not commonly acknowledged when distance interposes; most men would be mortally ashamed to let a next-door neighbor starve, although they may feel no call to lessen their luxuries when thousands, whom they could as easily succor, are perishing in the antipodes.  And there is a measure of necessity in this; to burden our minds with the thought of the suffering in India, in Russia, in Japan, leads to a paralyzing sense of impotence.  If we confine our thought to the dwellers on our street or in our town, it may not seem utterly hopeless to try to remedy their distress; to improve the situation of the laborers in one’s own shop or factory lies within the limits of practicability.  But the Christian doctrine of the universal brotherhood of man is becoming a working principle at last; and millions of dollars and thousands of our ablest young men and women are crossing the oceans to uplift and civilize the more backward nations, in deference to the admonition that we are our brothers’ keepers.  At home this recognition of the basic human relationship of living together on this little sphere, that is plunging with us all through the great deeps of space, should help to obliterate class lines and snobbishness and bring about a real democracy of fellowship.

(5) Finally, we have a duty to those dumb brothers of ours, the animal species that share with us the earth.  For they, too, feel pain and pleasure, and are much at our mercy.  We must learn “Never to blend our pleasure or our pride With sorrow of the meanest thing that feels.”

All needless hurting of sentient creatures is cruelty, whether of the boy who tortures frogs and flies, or of the grown man who takes his pleasure in hunting to death a frightened deer.  Beasts of prey must, indeed, be ruthlessly put to death, just as we execute murderers; among them are to be counted flies, mosquitoes, rats, and the other pests so deadly to the human race and to other animals.  But death should be inflicted as painlessly as possible; no humane man will prolong the suffering of the humblest creature for the sake of “sport” or take pleasure in the killing.  We must say with Cowper “I would not enter on my list of friends, (Though graced with polished manners and fine sense, Yet wanting sensibility) the man Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm.”

This does not necessarily imply that we may not rear and kill animals for food.  When properly slaughtered, they suffer inappreciably-no more, and probably less, than they would otherwise suffer before death; the fear of the hunted animal is not present, and there is no danger of leaving mate and offspring to suffer.  Indeed, the animals that are bred for food would not have their chance to live at all but for serving that end; and their existence is ordinarily, without doubt, of some positive balance of worth to them.  Certainly the rearing of cattle and sheep and chickens adds appreciably to the picturesqueness and richness of human life; and if dieticians are to be believed, their food value could hardly be replaced by substitutes.