I hope to make people realize how totally helpless animals are, how dependent on us, trusting as a child must be that we will be kind and take care of their needs […] [They] are an obligation put on us, a responsibility we have no right to neglect, or violate by cruelty.

James Herriot (1916-1995) British veterinary surgeon and writer [pen name of James Alfred "Alf" Wight]

(Attributed)