RECORDING SECRETARY The Board of Governors of St. Jude's Hospital is now in session. Sir Danvers Carew, KBE, Chairman. His Grace, The Bishop of Basingstoke. General Lord Glossop. The Right Honorable Sir Archibald Proops, Q.C. Lady Beaconsfield. Lord Savage. The Order of business will be conducted by the Secretary to the Board of Governors, Mr. Simon Stride.
STRIDE Proposition No. 929 - Presented by Dr. Henry Jekyll.
GENERAL GLOSSOP Jekyll, you're all talk an' no result!...
BISHOP OF BASINGSTOKE Forever asking us to endorse empty promises!
SIR ARCHIBALD PROOPS What's all the mystery? Much ado about nothing, if you ask me...
LADY BEACONSFIELD You're the laughing stock of your profession and polite society! The mad scientist!
STRIDE Order! Order!
JEKYLL Distinguished Governors, I have glimpsed the future. Seen miracles that stun the mind And marvels only science can find To shape tomorrow for mankind. And I can show them to you If you wish me to.
Friends, you're aware there are two sides to each of us Good and evil, compassion and hate. If we could extract all the evil from each of us Think of the world that we could create! A world without anger or violence or strife Where man wouldn't kill anymore! A world of compassion, where passion for life Would banish the madness of war!
I'm close to finding the key to duality Chemical Formulae which could and would Alter the patterns of man's personality Guiding him either to evil or good! Weigh the potential, the great possibilities Colleagues - dear friends, understand! We have a chance to make history here in our hand!
Each of us is the embodiment of two distinct and opposing forces - Good and Evil - each fighting for supremacy inside us. If we could separate these two forces, we could control and ultimately eliminate all evil from mankind. My experiments with animals have led me to believe that the day is not far off when this separation will be possible. To achieve it, I must be allowed to try my formula on a living human being!
BISHOP OF BASINGSTOKE And what if you're right, Jekyll? And you do manage to separate Good from Evil - What happens to the evil?
JEKYLL There are doomed, broken souls in a thousand asylums I defy you to say you don't care if you can! In the name of compassion and medical science, I can save many lives if you give me one man!
BISHOP OF BASINGSTOKE I tell you now - the Church will never sanction it!
VARIOUS Sacrilege! Lunacy! Blasphemy! Heresy!
SIR ARCHIBALD PROOPS You seem to be treading on dangerous ground. In legal terms, I'd say, extremely unsound!
BISHOP OF BASINGSTOKE The whole thing's un-christian, barbaric and odd! You're playing with fire when you start to play God!
STRIDE The Bishop speaks for all of us, when he says you're playing God! There's such a thing as ethics over which you ride rough-shod! You're a Doctor, not a saviour, Doctor Jekyll, for a start! But I judge from your behaviour You can't tell the two apart!
JEKYLL Dear Mr. Stride, I am simply a scientist. I have a code to which I remain true! I don't presume to the stature of moralist. I leave pretension like that, Sir, to you!
SIR DANVERS Henry, I've always encouraged your enterprise And I've been hopefull that you would succeed! But in the face of these powerful arguments, I see no choice but for you to concede!
JEKYLL I know my fate is yours to choose But if they win, the world would lose I am on the brink of great success! I beg you, Governors, you must say "Yes!"