What is The Four Stages of Cruelty?
{{italictitle}} [[Image:William Hogarth 006.jpg|thumb|right|A [[portriat]] of [[William Hogarth]]]] [[File:Cruelty4.JPG|thumb|The reward for Tom's life of cruelty is to be [[execution|executed]] and have his body [[dissection|dissected.]]]] '''''The Four Stages of Cruelty''''' is a [[wikt:series|series]] of four printed [[engraving]]s. They were [[publication|published]] by the English [[artist]] [[William Hogarth]] in 1751. Every print is about a different part of life of Tom Nero, a [[fiction]]al (not real) character. The ''First stage of [[wikt:cruel|Cruelty]]'' shows Nero, when he is a child, hurting a [[dog]]. In the ''Second stage of cruelty'', Nero, who is an [[adult]], beats his [[horse]]. Then in ''Cruelty in perfection'', he becomes a [[robbery|robber]] and [[murder]]s his [[pregnancy|pregnant]] [[wikt:lover|lover]]. At last, in ''The reward of cruelty'', his body is taken from the [[gallows]] after his [[death penalty|execution]] and is cut up into pieces by [[surgery|surgeons]]. This last annotation refers directly to the act of parliament then under consideration and passed in 1752 which changed the law to require the bodies of executed murderers to be surrendered to the surgeons for use in anatomy classes and only buried after they had been anatomized. The act was created in response to the increase in murders, especially in the suburbs of London. William Hogarth, who had been very [[sorrow|unhappy]] at the acts of cruelty that he saw on the streets of [[London]], printed the pictures for [[morality|moral]] learning. They were printed on cheap paper for poor people. The pictures are rougher and more violent than Hogarth's other works, which usually have touches of [[humor]]. He had felt he needed to do this to make people understand his message. However, the pictures still have the small, careful details that Hogarth is famous for. == History == Like most of his other prints, such as [[Beer Street and Gin Lane|''Beer Street'' and ''Gin Lane'']], Hogarth wanted ''The Four Stages of Cruelty'' to