Page:Henry Stephens Salt - A Plea for Vegetarianism and Other Essays.pdf/48

Rh And lastly, it may be well to point out why a Vegetarian diet, which would thus establish temperance without austerity, and liberality without extravagance, is, from an intellectual point of view, to be regarded as of such extreme importance. And here I cannot resist the desire of quoting a remarkable passage from a pamphlet published by the Vegetarian Society —“Can you imagine a gross feeder on turtle-soup or venison, high game, and rotten cheese, a self-indulgent drinker, being a man of bright, pure, simple tastes and instincts? Would you go to such a man and expect him to catch the ethereal beauties of some of Shelley's choicer pieces? . . . You would not ; you would feel, and justly, that such perceptions were too fine, too delicate for him : that the animal was too strong in him ; the mind, the spirit, too little, too weak, too puny for such higher thoughts as these.” Grossness of diet is indeed a fertile cause of dulness and dejection of mind, and therefore we ﬁnd that most great men have been abstemious in their way of living, and especially so when occupied on any great work. The complaint of Sir Andrew