Page:Substance of the Work Entitled Fruits and Farinacea The Proper Food of Man.djvu/11



In the the author describes how he was first led to study the subject. Having read a paper to a literary society on the phenomena of sensation—after which a discussion took place on the resemblance of man to the superior animals in nerves and brain—the following question occurred to him:

"Is man justified in slaughtering animals for his food, seeing that they are exquisitely sensible of pleasure and pain?"

The answer which he mentally returned was: That if the flesh of animals be necessary to our welfare, then we are justified, provided that no needless pain be given in the slaughter. But if health, strength, and happiness can be maintained, and equal longevity, without flesh meat, then neither wisdom nor benevolence can sanction the practice, especially with the cruelties that are daily perpetrated in it.

Extensive studies then gradually led him to the conviction that a flesh diet is not only not necessary, but is pernicious to man. In consequence he renounced it in his own practice, and testifies, in his preface, that he was rewarded by better health and more real enjoyment.

In his he remarks how prevalent is the failure of man's Reason where his own welfare is concerned.