Page:Henry Stephens Salt - A Plea for Vegetarianism and Other Essays.pdf/90

Rh have been accustomed to eat ﬂesh-food, no more proves that animals were created for this purpose than the existence of cannibalism proves that missionaries are “sent” to the South Sea Islands solely as an article of food, or the existence of slavery that black men were “sent” to be the slaves of white. In barbarous times cruel practices are originated, and afterwards are confirmed by centuries of habit, till at last, when humanity raises a protest against them, men are so blinded by custom as to attribute to God or nature that which is in reality only the result of their own vice and degradation.

10. The fallacy derived from “the necessity of taking life.” Many people seem to think it a sufficient refutation of Vegetarian principles to point out that it is absolutely necessary in some cases to take the lives of animals. They delight in showing that we are obliged to kill wild animals, to keep down vermin, and to destroy domestic animals when old and diseased : or that we incidentally take life even in such innocent acts as cooking a cabbage or drinking a glass of water. The fallacy consists partly in wrongly assuming that the object of Vegetarianism is “not to take any life ;” whereas it is