Chapter XVII: Byron. 1788-1824 (2)

[93] We here take occasion to observe that, while final appeals to our sacred Scriptures to determine any sociological question--whether of slavery, polygamy, war, or of dietetics--cannot be too strongly deprecated, a candid and impartial inquirer, nevertheless, will gladly recognise traces of a consciousness of the unspiritual nature of the sacrificial altar and shambles. He will gladly recognise that if--as might be expected in so various a collection of sacred writings produced by different minds in different ages--frequent sanction of the materialist mode of living may be urged on the one side; on the other hand, the inspiration of the more exalted minds is in accord with the practice of the true spiritual life. Cf. _Gen._ i., 29, 30; _Isaiah_ i., 11-17, and xi., 9 _Ps._ l., 9-14; _Ps._ lxxxi., 14-17; _Ps._ civ., 14, 15; _Prov._ xxiii., 2, 3, 20, 21; _Prov._ xxvii., 25-27: _Prov._ xxx., 8, 22; _Prov._ xxxi., 4; _Eccl._ vi., 7; _Matt._ vi. 31; 1 _Cor._ viii., 13, and ix., 25; _Rom._ viii., 5-8, 12, 13; _Phil._ iii., 19, and iv., 8; _James_ ii., 13, 4, and iv., 1-3; 1 _Pet._ ii., 11. Perhaps, next to the alleged authority of _Gen._ ix. (noticed and refuted by Tertullian, as already quoted), the trance-vision of St. Peter is most often urged by the _bibliolaters_ (or those who revere the _letter_ rather than the _true inspiration_ of the Sacred Books) as a triumphant proof of biblical sanction of materialism. Yet, unless, indeed, _literalism_ is to over-ride the most ordinary rules of common sense, as well as of criticism, all that can be extracted from the “Vision” (in which were presented to the sleeper “all manner of four-footed beasts of the earth, and _wild beasts_ and _creeping things_,” which it will hardly be contented he was expected to eat) is the fact of a mental illumination, by which the Jewish Apostle recognises the folly of his countrymen in arrogating to themselves the exclusive privileges of the “Chosen People.” Besides, as has already been pointed out, the earliest traditions concur in representing St. Peter as always a strict abstinent, insomuch that he is stated to have celebrated the “Eucharist” with nothing but bread and salt.--_Clement Hom._, xiv., 1.

[94] _Homily_, lxix. on _Mat._ xxii., 1-14.

[95] The _male_ sex, according to our ideas, might have been more properly apostrophised; and St. Chrysostom may seem, in this passage and elsewhere, to be somewhat partial in his invective. Candour, indeed, forces us to remark that the “Golden-mouthed,” in common with many others of the Fathers, and with the Greek and Eastern world in general, depreciated the qualities, both moral and mental, of the feminine sex. That the weaker are what the stronger choose to make them, is an obvious truth generally ignored in all ages and countries--by modern satirists and other writers, as well as by a Simonides or Solomon. The _partial_ severity of the Archbishop of Constantinople, it is proper to add, may be justified, in some measure, by the contemporary history of the Court of Byzantium, where the beautiful and licentious empress Eudoxia ruled supreme.

[96] St. Chrysostom seems to have derived this forcible appeal from Seneca. Compare the remarks of the latter, Ep. cx.: “At, mehercule, ista solicite scrutata varieque condita, cum subierint ventrem, una atque cadem fæditas occupabit. Vis ciborum voluptatem contemnere? _Exitum specta._”

[97] The _Homilies_ of St. John Chrysostom, Archbishop of Constantinople, Translated by Members of the English Church. Parker, Oxford. See _Hom._ vii. on _Phil._ ii. for a forcible representation of the inferiority, in many points, of our own to other species.

[98] For example, we may refer to the fact of trials of “criminal” dogs, and other non-human beings, with all the formalities of ordinary courts of justice, and in the gravest manner recorded by credible witnesses. The convicted “felons” were actually hanged with all the circumstances of human executions. Instances of such trials are recorded even so late as the sixteenth century.

[99] His biographer, Marinus, writes in terms of the highest admiration of his virtues as well as of his genius, and of the perfection to which he had attained by his unmaterialistic diet and manner of living. He seems to have had a remarkably cosmopolitan mind, since he regarded with equal respect the best parts of all the then existing religious systems; and he is said even to have paid solemn honours to all the most illustrious, or rather most meritorious, of his philosophic predecessors. That his intellect, sublime and exalted as it was, had contracted the taint of superstition must excite our regret, though scarcely our wonder, in the absence of the light of modern science; nor can there be any difficulty in perceiving how the miracles and celestial apparitions--which form a sort of halo around the great teachers--originated, viz., in the natural enthusiasm of his zealous but uncritical disciples. One of his principal works is _On the Theology of Plato_, in six books. Another of his productions was a Commentary on the _Works and Days of Hesiod_. Both are extant. He died at an advanced age in 485, having hastened his end by excessive asceticism.

[100] _Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_, xl. This testimony of the great historian to the merits of the last of the New-Platonists is all the more weighty as coming from an authority notoriously the most unimpassioned and unenthusiastic, perhaps, of all writers. Compare his remarkable expression of personal feeling--guardedly stated as it is--upon the question of kreophagy in his chapter on the history and manners of the Tartar nations (chap. xxvi).

[101] _Trattato della Vita Sobria_, 1548.

[102] _Sævior armis Luxuria._ We may be tempted to ask ourselves whether we are reading denunciations of the gluttony and profusion of the sixteenth century or contemporary reports of public dinners in our own country, _e.g._, of the Lord Mayor’s annual dinner. The vast amount of slaughter of all kinds of victims to supply the various dishes of _one_ of these exhibitions of national gluttony can be adequately described only by the use of the Homeric word _hecatomb_--slaughter of hundreds.

[103] _Amorevole Esortazione a Seguire La Vita Ordinata e Sobria._

[104] Cornaro’s heterodoxy in dietetics was not allowed, as may well be supposed, to pass unchallenged by his contemporaries. One of his countrymen, a person of some note, Sperone Speroni, published a reply under the title of “Contra la Sobrietà;” but soon afterwards recanting his errors (_rimettendosi spontaneamente nel buon sentiero_) he wrote a Discourse in favour of Temperance. About the same time there appeared in Paris an “Anti-Cornaro,” written “against all the rules of good taste,” and which the editors of the _Biographie Universelle_ characterise as full of remarks “_tout à fait oiseuses_.”

[105] More points out very forcibly that to hang for theft is tantamount to offering a premium for _murder_. Two hundred and fifty years later Beccaria and other humanitarians vainly advanced similar objections to the criminal code of christian Europe. It is hardly necessary to remark that this Draconian bloodthirstiness of English criminal law remained to belie the name of “civilisation” so recently as fifty years ago.

[106] Erasmus (who, to lash satirically and more effectively the various follies and crimes of men places the genius of Folly itself in the pulpit) seems to have shared the feeling of his friend in regard to the character of “sport.” “When they (the ‘sportsmen’) have run down their victims, what strange pleasure they have in cutting them up! Cows and sheep may be slaughtered by common butchers, but those animals that are killed in hunting must be mangled by none under a gentleman, who will fall down on his knees, and drawing out a slashing dagger (for a common knife is not good enough) after several ceremonies shall dissect all the joints as artistically as the best skilled anatomist, while all who stand round shall look very intently and seem to be mightily surprised with the novelty, though they have seen the same thing a hundred times before; and he that can but dip his finger and taste of the blood shall think his own bettered by it. And yet the constant feeding on such diet does but assimilate them to the nature (?) of those animals they eat,” &c.--_Encomium Moriæ_, or _Praise of Folly_. If we recall to mind that three centuries and a half have passed away since More and Erasmus raised their voices against the sanguinary pursuits of hunting, and that it is still necessary to reiterate the denunciation, we shall justly deplore the slow progress of the human mind in all that constitutes true morality and refinement of feeling.

[107] _Utopia_ II.

[108] For a full and eloquent exposition of the social evils which threaten the country from the natural but mischievous greed of landowners and farmers, our readers are referred, in particular, to Professor Newman’s admirable Lectures upon this aspect of the Vegetarian creed, delivered before the Society at various times. (Heywood: Manchester.)

[109] _Utopia._ Translated into English by Ralph Robinson, Fellow of Corpus Christi College. London: 1556; reprinted by Edward Arber, 1869. We have used this English edition as more nearly representing the style of Sir Thomas More than a modern version. It is a curious fact that no edition of the _Utopia_ was published in England during the author’s lifetime--or, indeed, before that of Robinson, in 1551. It was first printed at Louvain; and, after revision by the author, it was reprinted at Basle, under the auspices of Erasmus, still in the original Latin.

[110] “With plaintive cries, all covered with blood, and in the attitude of a suppliant.” See the story of the death of Silvia’s deer (_Æneis_, viii.)--the most touching episode in the whole epic of Virgil. The affection of the Tuscan girl for her favourite, her anxious care of her, and the deep indignation excited amongst her people by the murder of the deer by the son of Æneas and his intruding followers--the cause of the war that ensued--are depicted with rare grace and feeling.

[111] “It was in the slaughter, in the primæval times, of wild beasts (I suppose) the knife first was stained with the warm life-blood.”--See _Ovid Metam._ xv.

[112] _Christian_ theology, to which doubtless Montaigne here refers, the force of truth compels us to note, has always uttered a very “uncertain sound” in regard to the rights and even to the frightful sufferings of the non-human species. Excepting, indeed, two or three isolated passages in the Jewish and Christian sacred Scriptures which, according to the theologians, bear a somewhat _equivocal_ meaning, it is not easy to discover what _particular_ theological or ecclesiastical maxims Montaigne could adduce.

[113] We use the term in deference to universal custom, although Francis Bacon protested 250 years ago that “Antiquity, as we call it, is the young state of the world; for those times are ancient when the world is ancient, and not those we vulgarly account ancient by computing backwards--so that the present time is the real Antiquity.”--_Advancement of Learning, I._ See also _Novum Organum_.

[114] Compare Shakspere’s eloquent indignation:--

“Man, proud Man,
Dressed in a little brief authority,
Most ignorant of what he’s most assured--
His glassy essence--like an angry ape,
Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven,” &c.

_Measure for Measure._

[115] With these just and common-sense arguments of Montaigne compare the very remarkable treatise (remarkable both by the profession and by the age of the author) of Hieronymus or Jerome Rorarius, published under the title--“That the [so-called] irrational animals often make use of reason better than men.” (_Quod Animalia Bruta Sæpe Utantur Ratione Melius Homine._) It was given to the world by the celebrated physician, Gabriel Naudé, in 1648, one hundred years after it was written, and, as pointed out by Lange, it is therefore earlier than the Essais of Montaigne. “It is distinguished,” according to Lange, “by its severe and serious tone, and by the assiduous emphasising of just such traits of the lower animals as are most generally denied to them, as being products of the higher faculties of the soul. With their virtues the vices of men are set in sharp contrast. We can therefore understand that the MS., although written by a priest, who was a friend both of Pope and Emperor, had to wait so long for publication.” (_Hist. of Materialism._ Vol. i., 225. Eng. Trans.) It is noteworthy that the title, as well as the arguments, of the book of Rorarius reveals its original inspiration--the Essay of Plutarch. Equally heterodox upon this subject is the _De La Sagesse_ of Montaigne’s friend, Pierre Charron.

[116] _Essais_ de Michel de Montaigne, II., 12.

[117] See Article in _English Cyclopædia_.

[118] See _Elémens de la Philosophie de Newton_. The whole passage breathes the true spirit of humanity and philosophy, and deserves to be quoted in full in this place: “Il y a surtout dans l’homme une disposition à la compassion aussi généralement répandue que nos autres instincts. Newton avait cultivé ce sentiment d’humanité, et il l’etendait jusqu’aux animaux. Il était fortement convaincu avec Locke, que Dieu a donné aux animaux une mésure d’idées, et les mêmes sentiments qu’à nous. Il ne pouvait penser que Dieu, qui ne fait rien en vain, eût donné aux animaux des organes de sentiment, _afin qu’elles n’eussent point de sentiment_. Il trouvait une contradiction bien affreuse à croire que les animaux sentent, et à les faire souffrir. Sa morale s’accordait en ce point avec sa philosophie. _Il ne cédait qu’avec répugnance à l’usage barbare de nous nourrir du sang et de la chair des êtres semblables à nous_, que nous caressons tous les jours. Il ne permit jamais dans sa maison qu’on les fit mourir par des morts lentes et recherchées, pour en rendre la nourriture plus délicieuse. Cette compassion qu’il avait pour les animaux se tournait en vraie charité pour les hommes. En effet, _sans l’humanité--vertu qui comprend toutes les vertus--on ne mériterait guère le nom de philosophe_.”--_Elémens_ v. An expression of feeling in sufficiently striking contrast to the ordinary ideas. Compare _Essay on the Human Understanding_, ii., 2.

[119] _History of Materialism._--We may here observe that Descartes seems to have adopted his extraordinary theory as to the non-human races as a sort of _dernier resort_. In a letter to one of his friends (Louis Racine) he declares himself driven to his theory by the rigour of the dilemma, that (seeing the innocence of the victims of man’s selfishness) it is necessary either that they should he insensible to suffering, or that God, who has made them, should be unjust. Upon which Gleïzès makes the following reflection: “This reasoning is conclusive. One must either be a Cartesian, or allow that man is very vile. Nothing is more rigorous than this consequence.”--(_Thalysie Ou La Nouvelle Existence_). La Fontaine has well illustrated the absurdity of the animated machine theory in _Fables_ x. 1.

[120] See “_Elémens de la Philosophie de Newton_.”

[121] _Suspecta mihi semper fuerit_ (he writes) _ipsa hominis_ φιλαυτία.

[122] See Gassendi’s Letter, _Viro Clarissimo et Philosopho ac Medico Expertissimo Joanni Baptistæ Helmontio Amico Suo Singulari_. Dated, Amsterdam, 1629.

[123] _Physics._ Book II. _De Virtutibus._

[124] See _Philosophiæ Epicuri Syntagma. De Sobrietate contra Gulam._ (“View of the Philosophy of Epikurus: On Sobriety as opposed to Gluttony.”) Part III. Florentiæ, 1727. Folio. Vol. III.

[125] _Advancement of Learning_, iv., 2. Bacon’s suggestion seems to imply that human beings were still vivisected, for the “good” of science, in his time. Celsus, the well-known Latin physician of the second century, had protested against this cold-blooded barbarity of deliberately cutting up a living human body. The wretched victims of the vivisecting knife were, it seems, slaves, criminals, and captives, who were handed over by the authorities to the physiological “laboratory.” Harvey, Bacon’s contemporary, is notorious (and, it ought to be added, infamous) for the number and the unrelenting severity of his experiments upon the non-human slaves, which, though constantly alleged by modern vivisectors to have been the means by which he discovered the “circulation of the blood,” have been clearly proved to have served merely as demonstrations in physiology to his pupils. But we no longer wonder at Harvey’s indifference to the horrible suffering of which he was the cause, when we read the similar atrocities of vivisection and “pathology” of our own time. From the cold-blooded cruelties of Harvey, who was accustomed to amuse Charles I. and his family with his demonstrations, it is a pleasant relief to turn to the better feeling of Shakspere on that subject. See his _Cymbeline_ (i., 6), where the Queen, who is experimenting in poisons, tells her physician,

“I will try the force of these thy compounds on such creatures as
We count not worth the hanging--but none human.”

and is reminded that she would “from this practice but make hard her heart.” Such a rebuke is in keeping with the true feeling which inspired the poet to picture the undeserved pangs of the hunted Deer in _As You Like It_, ii., 1.

[126] _Advancement of Learning._ viii., 2.

[127] See _Acetaria_ (page 170). By John Evelyn.

[128] The tract of Samuel Hartlib, entitled, _A Design for Plenty, by a Universal Planting of Fruit Trees_, which appeared during the Commonwealth Government, no doubt suggested to Evelyn his kindred publication. Hartlib (of a distinguished German family) settled in this country somewhere about the year 1630. By his writings, in advocacy of better agriculture and horticulture, he has deserved a grateful commemoration from after-times. Cromwell gave him a pension of £300, which was taken away by Charles II., and he died in poverty and neglect. It was to him Milton dedicated his _Tractate on Education_.

[129] Locke (one of the very highest names in Philosophy) had already exhorted English mothers to make their children abstain “wholly from flesh,” at least until the completion of the fourth or fifth year. He strongly recommends a very sparing amount of flesh for after years; and thinks that many maladies may be traceable to the foolish indulgence of mothers in respect to diet.--See _Thoughts on Education_, 1690.

[130] He quotes, amongst others, Tertullian _De Jejuniis_ (On Fasting), cap. iv.; Jerome (_Adv. Jovin_); Clemens of Alexandria (_Strom._ vii.); Eusebius, _Preparatio Evangelica_ (Preparation for the Gospel), who cites several abstinents from amongst the philosophers of the old theologies.

[131] _Acetaria_ (“A Discourse of Salads”). Dedicated to Lord Somers, of Evesham, Lord High Chancellor of England, and President of the Royal Society, London, 1699.

[132] Translated by Cowper from the Latin poems of Milton. In a note to the original poem Thomas Warton justly remarks that “Milton’s panegyrics on temperance both in eating and in drinking, resulting from his own practice, are frequent.”

[133] _Paradise Lost_, v. and xi. Cf. _Queen Mab_.

[134] _Le sang humain abruti ne pouvait plus s’élever aux choses intellectuelles._ See _Discours sur L’Histoire Universelle_, a historical sketch which, though necessarily infected by the theological prejudices of the bishop, is, for the rest, considering the period in which it was written, a meritorious production as one of the earliest attempts at a sort of “philosophy of history.”

[135] _Penny Cyclopædia_, Article Mandeville.

[136] Upon which Ritson aptly remarks: “The sheep is not so much ‘designed’ for the _man_ as the _man_ is for the _tiger_, this animal being naturally carnivorous, which man is not. But nature, and justice, and humanity are not always one and the same thing.” To this remark we may add with equal force, that almost all the living beings upon whom our species preys have been so artificially changed from their natural condition for the gratification of its selfish appetite as to be with difficulty identified with the original stocks. So much for this theory of creative _design_.

[137] _Fable of the Bees_, i. 187, &c.

[138] _Fable_ xxxvi., _Pythagoras and the Countryman_. This fable of Gay may have been suggested by that of Æsop--preserved by Plutarch--who represents a wolf watching a number of shepherds eating a sheep, and saying to himself--“If _I_ were doing what _you_ are now about, what an uproar you would make!” See also the instructive fable of La Fontaine--_L’Homme et la Couleuvre_, one of the finest in the whole twelve Books (_Livre_ x., 2), in which the Cow and Ox accuse the base ingratitude of Man for the cruel neglect, and, finally, for the barbarous slaughter of his fellow-labourers. The Cow, appealed to by the Adder, replies:--

“Pourquoi dissimuler?
Je nourris celui-ci depuis longues années:
Il n’a sans mes bienfaits passé nulles journées.
Tout n’est que pour lui seul: mon lait et mes enfants
Le font à la maison revenir les mains pleines.
Même j’ai rétabli sa santé, que les ans
Avaient altérée; et mes peines
Ont pour but son plaisir ainsi que son besoin.
Enfin me voilà vieille. _Il me laisse
Sans herbe._ S’il voulait encore me laisser paître!
Mais je suis attachée.....
Force coups, peu de gré. Puis, quand il était vieux,
On croyait l’honorer chaque fois que les hommes
_Achetaient de son sang l’indulgence des dieux_.”

[139] _The Wild Boar and the Ram._ For admirable rebukes of human arrogance, see _The Elephant and the Bookseller_ and _The Man and the Flea_.

[140] He was at one time so corpulent that he could not get in and out of his carriage in visiting his patients at Bath.

[141] One of the many excellences of the non-flesh dietary is this essential quality of fruits and vegetables, that they contain in themselves sufficient liquid to allow one to dispense with a large proportion of all extraneous drinks, and certainly with all alcoholic kinds. Hence it is at once the easiest and the surest preventive of all excessive drinking. Much convincing testimony has been collected to this effect by the English and German Vegetarian Societies.

[142] It is neither necessary nor possible for everyone to practise so extreme abstemiousness; but it is instructive to compare it for a moment with the ordinary and prevalent indulgence in eating.

[143] _A Life of George Cheyne, M.D._, Parker and Churchill, 1846. See also _Biog. Britannica_.

[144] Dr. Samuel Johnson gave up wine by the advice of Cheyne, and drank tea with Mrs. Thrale and Boswell till he died, æt. 75.

[145] Bayle, the author of the great _Dictionnaire Historique et Critique_ (1690), to whom belongs the lasting honour of having inaugurated the critical method in history and philosophy, which has since led to such extensive and important results, seems also to have been the first explicitly to state the difficulties of that greatest _crux_ of Theology--the problem of the existence, or rather dominance, of Evil. His rival Le Clerc, in his _Bibliothéque_, took up the orthodox cudgels. Lord Shaftesbury, the celebrated theologian and moralist, wrote his dialogue--_The Moralists_ (1709)--in direct answer to Bayle, followed the next year by the _Theodike or Vindication of the Deity_ of Leibnitz. Two of the most able and distinguished of the Anti-Optimists are Voltaire and Schopenhauer, the former of whom never wearies of using his unrivalled powers of irony and sarcasm on the _Tout est Bien_ theory. As for the latter philosopher, he has carried his Anti-Optimism to the extremes of Pessimism.

[146] Pope here is scarcely logical upon his own premiss. It seems impossible, upon any grounds of reason or analogy, to deny to the lower animals a posthumous existence while vindicating it for ourselves, inasmuch as the _essential_ conditions of existence are identical for many other beings. To the serious thinker the question of a post-terrestrial state of existence must stand or fall for both upon the same grounds. Yet what can well be more weak, or more of a subterfuge, than the pretence of many well-meaning persons, who seek to excuse their indifferentism to the cruel sufferings of their humble fellow-beings by the expression of a belief or a hope that there is a future retributive state for them? It must be added that this idle speculation--whether the non-human races are capable of post-terrestrial life or no--might, to any serious apprehension, seem to be wholly beside the mark. But what can be more monstrously ridiculous (γέλοιον, in Lucian’s language) than the inconsistency of those who would maintain the affirmative, and yet persist in _devouring_ their clients? _Risum teneatis, amici!_

[147] _Spence’s Anecdotes_ and _The Guardian_, May 21, 1713. His indignation was equally aroused by the tortures of the vivisectors of the day. And he demands how do men know that they have “a right to kill beings whom they [at least, the vast majority] are so little above, for their own curiosity, or even for some use to them.”

[148] See _Travels_, &c. Part IV.

[149] _Dict. Phil._, in article _Viande_, where it is lamented that his book, as far as appeared, had made no more converts than had the Treatise of Porphyry fifteen centuries before.

[150] See the amusing scene of the gourmand Canon Sedillo and Dr. Sangrado, who had been called in to the gouty and fever-stricken patient: “‘Pray, what is your ordinary diet?’ [asks the physician.] ‘My usual food,’ replied the Canon, ‘is broth and juicy meat.’ ‘Broth and juicy meat!’ cried the doctor, alarmed. ‘I do not wonder to find you sick; such dainty dishes are poisoned pleasures and snares that luxury spreads for mankind, so as to ruin them the more effectually.... What an irregularity is here! what a frightful regimen! You ought to have been dead long ago. How old are you, pray?’ ‘I am in my sixty-ninth year,’ replied the Canon. ‘Exactly,’ said the physician; ‘an early old age is always the fruits of intemperance. If you had drunk nothing else than pure water all your life, and had been satisfied with simple nourishment--such as boiled apples, for example--you would not now be tormented with the gout, and all your limbs would perform their functions with ease. I do not despair, however, of setting you to rights, provided that you be wholly resigned to my directions.’” (_Adventures of Gil Blas_, ii., 2.) We may comment upon the satire of the novelist (for so it was intended), that irony or sarcasm is a legitimate and powerful weapon when directed against falsehood; that there was, and is, only too much in the practice and principles of the profession open to ridicule; but that the attempted ridicule of the better living does not redound to the penetration or good sense of the satirist.

[151] Compare the similar thoughts of the Latin poet, _Metam._ xv.

[152] _Autumn._ Read the verses which immediately follow, describing, with profound pathos, the sufferings and anguish of the hunted Deer and Hare.

[153] _Summer._

[154] _Observations on Man, II., 3._

[155] Quam vehementes haberent tirunculi impetus primos ad optima quæque _si quis exhortaretur, si quis impelleret_! The general failure Seneca traces partly to the fault of the schoolmasters, who prefer to instil into the minds of their pupils a knowledge of _words_ rather than of _things_--of _dialectics_ rather than of _dietetics_ (nos docent disputare non vivere), and partly to the fault of parents who expect a head in place of a heart training. (See _Letters to Lucilius_, cviii.) _Quis doctores docebit?_

[156] An instance of the common confusion of thought and logic. The too obvious fact that a large proportion of animals are carnivorous neither proves nor justifies the carnivorousness of the _human_ species. The real question is, is the human race originally _frugivorous_ or _carnivorous_? Is it allied to the Tiger or to the Ape?

[157] “Who is this female personification ‘Nature’? What are ‘her principles,’ and where does she reside?” asks Ritson quoting this passage.

[158] _The World._ No. 190, as quoted by Ritson.

[159] Persian poets of the tenth and thirteenth centuries of our era.

[160] _Asiatic Researches._ iv. 12

[161] _Elémens de la Philosophie de Newton_, v. Haller, the founder of modern physiology, assures us that “Newton, while he was engaged upon his _Optics_, lived almost entirely on bread, and wine, and water” (_Newtonus, dum_ Optica _scribebat, solo pœnè vino pane et aquâ vixit_).--_Elements of Physiology_, vi., 198.

[162] A fact which brings out into strong relief the entirely superfluous luxuries of living of the English residents.

[163] _Essai sur les Mœurs et l’Esprit des Nations_, introduction section xvi., and chap. iii. and iv.

[164] See _Gen._ ix. and _Ecclesiastes_ iii., 18, 19.--Note by Voltaire.

[165] See _Lettres d’Amabed à Shastasid_. See also article _Viande_ in the _Dictionnaire Philosophique_.

[166] _La Princesse de Babylone._ Cf. _Dialogue du Chapon et de la Poularde_.

[167] See article _Bêtes_ in the _Dict. Phil._

[168] _Elements of Physiology._

[169] Cf. Virgil’s “Magna parens frugum.”

[170] See the _Nouvelle Biographie Universelle_. Didot, Paris.

[171] _Græcorum Chirurgici Libri._ Firenze, 1754.

[172] _Dissertazione sopra l’uso esterno appresso gli Antichi dell’acqua fredda sul corpo umano._ Firenze, 1747.

[173] _Del Vitto Pithagorico Per Uso Della Medicina: Discorso D’Antonio Cocchi._ Firenze, 1743. A translation appeared in Paris in 1762 under the title of _Le Régime de Pythagore_.

[174] _Del Vitto Pithagorico._ Amongst the heralds and forerunners of Cocchi deserve to be mentioned with honour Ramazzini (1633-1714), who earned amongst his countrymen the title of Hippokrates the Third; Lessio (in his _Hygiastricon_, or Treatise on Health), in the earlier part of the 17th century; and Lemcry, the French Physician and Member of the Académie, author of _A Treatise on all Sorts of Food_, which was translated into English by D. Hay, M.D., in 1745.

[175] Rousseau adds in a note: “I know that the English boast loudly of their humanity and of the good disposition of their nation, which they term ‘good nature,’ but it is in vain for them to proclaim this far and wide. Nobody repeats it after them.” Gibbon, in the well-known passage in his xxvith chapter, in which he speculates upon the influence of flesh-eating in regard to the savage habits of the Tartar tribes, quoting this remark of Rousseau, in his ironical way, says: “Whatever we may think of the general observation, _we_ shall not easily allow the truth of his example.”--_Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_, xxvi.

[176] He corrects this mistake in a note: “One of my English translators has pointed out this error, and both [of my translators] have rectified it. Butchers and surgeons are received as witnesses, but the former are not admitted as jurymen or peers in _criminal_ trials, while surgeons are so.” Even this amended statement needs revision.

[177] How the French apostle of humanitarianism and refinement of manners, if he were living, would regard the recently reported practice of French and other physicians of sending their patients to the slaughter-houses to drink the blood of the newly-slaughtered oxen may be more easily imagined than expressed.

[178] Rather _carnes consumere nati_--“born simply to devour.”--See _Hor._, Ep. I., 2.

[179] _Emile: ou de l’Education_, II.

[180] _Julie_ IV., _Lettre_ 10. See also her protests against shooting and fishing.

[181] _Confessions._ One of his friends, Dussault, surprised him, it seems, on one occasion eating a “cutlet.” Rousseau, conscious of the betrayal of his principles, “blushed up to the whites of his eyes.” (See Gleïzè’s _Thalysic_.) In truth, as we have already observed, his principles on the subject of _dietetics_, as on some other matters, were better than his practice. His sensibility was always greater than his strength of mind.

[182] _Amœnitates Academicæ_, x., 8.

[183] This little word “seems” here, as in very many other controversies, has a vast importance and needs a double emphasis.

[184] Buffon here entirely ignores the true cause of the “inanition” of the poor classes of the community. It is not the want of _flesh_-meats, but the want of all solid and nutritious _meat_ of any kind, which is to be found amply in the abundant stores supplied by Nature at first hand in the various parts of the vegetable world. Were the poor able to procure, and were they instructed how best to use, the most nourishing of the various _farinacea_, fruits, and kitchen herbs, supplied by the home and foreign markets, we should hear nothing or little of the scandalous scenes of starvation which are at present of daily occurrence in our midst. The example of the Irish living upon a few potatoes and buttermilk, or of the Scotch peasantry, instanced by Adam Smith, proves how all-sufficient would be a diet judiciously selected from the riches of the vegetable world. For, _à fortiori_, if the Irish, living thus meagrely, not only support life, but exhibit a _physique_ which, in the last century, called forth the admiration of the author of _The Wealth of Nations_, might not our English poor thrive upon a richer and more substantial vegetable diet which could easily be supplied but for the astounding indifference of the ruling classes?

[185] _Hist. Naturelle, Le Bœuf._

[186] Edition of Swift’s Works. Canon Sydney Smith, equally celebrated as a _bon-vivant_ and as a wit, at the termination of his life writes thus to his friend Lord Murray: “You are, I hear, attending more to diet than heretofore. If you wish for anything like happiness in the _fifth_ act of life _eat and drink about one-half what you could eat and drink_. Did I ever tell you my calculation about eating and drinking? Having ascertained the weight of what I could live upon, so as to preserve health and strength, and what I did live upon, I found that, between ten and seventy years of age, I had eaten and drunk _forty-four horse wagon-loads of meat and drink more than would have preserved me in life and health_! The value of this mass of nourishment I considered to be worth seven thousand pounds sterling. It occurred to me _that I must, by my voracity, have starved to death fully a hundred persons_. This is a frightful calculation, but irresistibly true.” Commentary upon this candid statement is superfluous. _Ab uno disce omnes._ If amongst the richer classes the ordinary liver may consume a somewhat smaller quantity of life during his longer or shorter existence, at all events the _sum total_ must be a sufficiently startling one for all who may have the courage and candour to reflect upon this truly appalling subject. Another thought irresistibly suggests itself. What _proportion_ of human lives thus supported is of any real value in the world?

[187] In reply to this sort of apology it is obvious to ask--“Have the _frugivorous_ races, who form no inconsiderable proportion of the _mammals_, no claim to be considered?”

[188] To this very popular fallacy it is necessary only to object that Nature may very well be supposed able to maintain the proper balance for the most part. For the rest, man’s proper duty is to harmonise and regulate the various conditions of life, as far as in him lies, not indeed by satisfying his selfish propensities, but by assuming the part of a benevolent and beneficent superior. To this we may add with some force, that man appeared on the scene within a comparatively very recent geological period, so that the Earth fared, it seems, very well without him for countless ages.

[189] And, in point of fact, two-thirds at least of the whole human population of our globe.

[190] This popular excuse is perhaps the feeblest and most disingenuous of all the defences usually made for flesh-eating. Can the mere gift of life compensate for all the horrible and frightful sufferings inflicted, in various ways, upon their victims by the multiform selfishness and barbarity of man? To what unknown, as well as known, tortures are not every day the victims of the slaughter-house subjected? From their birth to their death, the vast majority--it is too patent a fact--pass an existence in which freedom from suffering of one kind or other--whether from insufficient food or confined dwellings on the one hand, or from the positive sufferings endured _in transitu_ to the slaughter-house by ship or rail, or by the brutal savagery of cattle-drivers, &c.--is the exception rather than the rule.

[191] _Moral and Political Philosophy_, i., 2. It is deeply to be deplored that Dr. Paley is in a very small minority amongst christian theologians, of candour, honesty, and feeling sufficient to induce them to dispute at all so orthodox a thesis as the right to slaughter for food. That he is compelled, by the force of truth and honesty, to abandon the popular pretexts and subterfuges, and to seek refuge in the _supposed_ authority of the book of _Genesis_, is significant enough. Of course, to all reasonable minds, such a course is tantamount to giving up the defence of kreophagy altogether; and, if it were not for theological necessity, it would be sufficiently surprising that Paley’s intelligence or candour did not discover that if flesh-eating is to be defended on biblical grounds, so, by parity of reasoning, are also to be defended--slavery, polygamy, wars of the most cruel kind, &c.

[192] _The Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy_, xii., 11. See, amongst others, the philosophical reflections of Mr. Greg in his _Enigmas of Life_, Appendix. But the subject has been most fully and satisfactorily dealt with by Professor Newman in his various Addresses.

[193] Compare the similar observation of Flourens, Secretary of the French Academy of Sciences, in his _Treatise on the Longevity of Man_ (Paris, 1812). He quotes Cornaro, Lessio, Haller, and other authorities on the reformed regimen.

[194] He well exposes the fatal mischief of _emulation_ (in place of love of truth and of love of knowledge, for its own sake) in schools which tends to intensify, if not produce, the _selfism_ dominant in all ranks of the community. Not the least meritorious of his exhortations to Governments is his desire that they would employ themselves in such useful works as the general planting of trees, producing nourishing foods, in place of devastating the earth by wars, &c.

[195] The reason, as given by himself, for his abandonment in after years of his self-imposed reform, is worthy neither of his philosophic acumen nor of his ordinary judgment. It seems that on one occasion, while his companions were engaged in sea-fishing, he observed that the captured fish, when opened, revealed in its interior the remains of another fish recently devoured. The young printer seemed to see in this fact the ordinance of Nature, by which living beings live by slaughter, and the justification of human carnivorousness. (See _Autobiography_.) This was, however, to use the famous Sirian’s phrase, “to reason badly;” for the sufficient answer to this alleged justification of man’s flesh-eating propensity is simply that the fish in question was, by natural organisation, _formed_ to prey upon its fellows of the sea, whereas man is _not formed_ by Nature for feeding upon his fellows of the land; and, further, that the larger proportion of _terrestrials_ do not live by slaughter.

[196] _Wealth of Nations_ iii., 341. See, too, Sir Hans Sloane (_Natural History of Jamaica_, i., 21, 22), who enumerates almost every species of vegetable food that has been, or may be, used for food, in various parts of the globe; the philosophic French traveller, Volney (_Voyages_), who, in comparing flesh with non-flesh feeders, is irresistibly forced to admit that the “habit of shedding blood, or even of seeing it shed, corrupts all sentiment of humanity;” the Swedish traveller Sparrman, the disciple of Linné, who corrects the astonishing physiological errors of Buffon as to the human digestive apparatus; Anquetil (_Récherches sur les Indes_), the French translator of the _Zend-Avesta_ who, from his sojourn with the vegetarian Hindus and Persians, derived those more refined ideas which caused him to discard the coarser Western living; and Sir F. M. Eden (_State of the Poor_).

[197] _History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_, xxvi. Notwithstanding Gibbon’s expression of horror, we shall venture to remark that the “unfeeling murderers” of the Tartar steppes, in slaughtering each for himself, are more just than the _civilised_ peoples of Europe, with whom a pariah-class is set apart to do the cruel and degrading work of the community.

[198] _The Task._ When Cowper wrote this (in 1782) the Law was entirely silent upon the rights of the lower animals to protection. It was not until nearly half a century later that the British Legislature passed the first Act (and it was a very partial one) which at all considered the rights of any non-human race. Yet Hogarth’s _Four Stages of Cruelty_--to say nothing of literature--had been several years before the world. It was passed by the persistent energy and courage of one man--an Irish member--who braved the greatest amount of scorn and ridicule, both within and without the Legislature, before he succeeded in one of the most meritorious enterprises ever undertaken. Martin’s Act has been often amended or supplemented, and always with no little opposition and difficulty.

[199] The term “Mercy,” it is important to observe, is one of those words of ambiguous meaning, which are liable, in popular parlance, to be misused. It seems to have a double origin--from _misericordia_, “Pity” (its better parentage), and _merces_, “Gain,” and, by deduction, “Pardon” granted for some consideration. It is in this latter sense that the term seems generally to be used in respect of the non-human races. But it is obvious to object that “pardon,” applicable to _criminals_, can have no meaning as applied to the innocent. _Pity_ or _Compassion_, still more _Justice_--these are the terms properly employed.

[200] The observation of a _non-Christian_ moralist (_Juvenal_, xv.) It is the motto chosen by Oswald for his title page.

[201] In the Hindu sacred scriptures, and especially in the teaching of the great founder of the most extensive religion on the globe, this regard for non-human life, however originating, is more obvious than in any other sacred books. But it is most charmingly displayed in that most interesting of all Eastern poetry and drama--_Sakuntala; or The Fatal Ring_, of the Hindu Kalidâsa, the most frequently translated of all the productions of Hindu literature. We may refer our readers also to _The Light of Asia_, an interesting versification of the principal teaching of Sakya-Muni or Gautama.

[202] _The Cry of Nature: an Appeal to Mercy and to Justice on behalf of the Persecuted Animals._ By John Oswald. London, 1791.

[203] _Long Life, or the Art of Prolonging Human Existence._

[204] See the _Nouvelle Biographie Universelle_ for complete enumeration of his writings.

[205] _Makrobiotik._

[206] Afterwards Sir Richard Phillips, whose admirable exposition of his reasons for abandoning flesh-eating, published in the _Medical Journal_, July 1811, is quoted in its due place.

[207] _Abstinence from Animal Food a Moral Duty_, IX. Ritson, in a note, quotes the expression of surprise of a French writer, that whereas abstinence “from blood and from things strangled” is especially and solemnly enjoined by the immediate successors of Christ, in a well-known prohibition, yet this sacred obligation is daily “made of none effect” by those calling themselves _Christians_.

[208] “I have known,” says Dr. Arbuthnot, “more than one instance of irascible passions having been much subdued by a vegetable diet.”--Note by Ritson.

[209] Written in 1802. Since that time the “pastime” of worrying bulls and bears, has in this country become illegal and extinct. Cock-fighting, though illegal, seems to be still popular with the “sporting” classes of the community.

[210] _General Advertiser_, March 4th, 1784. Since Ritson quoted this from the newspaper of his day, 80 years ago, the same scenes of equal and possibly of still greater barbarity have been recorded in our newspapers, season after season, of the royal and other hunts, with disgusting monotony of detail. Voltaire’s remarks upon this head are worthy of quotation: “It has been asserted that Charles IX. was the author of a book upon hunting. It is very likely that if this prince had cultivated less the art of torturing and killing other animals, and had not acquired in the forests the habit of seeing blood run, there would have been more difficulty in getting from him the order of St. Bartholomew. The chase is one of the most sure means for blunting in men the sentiment of pity for their own species; an effect so much the more fatal, as those who are addicted to it, placed in a more elevated rank, have more need of this bridle.”--_Œuvres_ LXXII., 213. In Flaubert’s remarkable story of _La Légende de St. Julien_ the hero “developes by degrees a propensity to bloodshed. He kills the mice in the chapel, the pigeons in the garden, and soon his advancing years gave him opportunity of indulging this taste in hunting. He spends whole days in the chase, caring less for the ‘sport’ than for the slaughter.” One day he shoots a Fawn, and while the despairing mother, “looking up to heaven, cried with a loud voice, agonising and human,” St. Julien remorselessly kills her also. Then the male parent, a noble-looking Stag, is shot last of all; but, advancing, nevertheless, he comes up to the terrified murderer, and “stopped suddenly, and with flaming eyes and solemn tone, as of a just judge, he spoke three times, while a bell tolled in the distance, ‘Accursed one! ruthless of heart! thou shalt slay thy father and mother also,’ and tottering and closing his eyes he expired.” The blood-stained man on one occasion is followed closely by all the victims of his wanton cruelty, who press around him with avenging looks and cries. He fulfils the prophecy of the Stag, and murders his parents.--See _Fortnightly Review_, April, 1878.

[211] It is scarcely necessary to remind our readers that a quarter of a century later (1827), when Martin had the courage to introduce the first bill for the prevention of cruelty to certain of the domesticated animals (a very partial measure after all), the humane attempt was greeted by an almost universal shout of ridicule and derision, both in and out of the Legislature.

[212] See Appendix.

[213] Quoted from an article in the _Gentleman’s Magazine_, (August, 1787), signed _Etonensīs_, who, amongst other particulars, states of the hero of his sketch that he was “one of the most original geniuses who have ever existed.... He was well skilled in natural philosophy, and might be said to have been a moral philosopher, not in _theory_ only, but in strict and uniform _practice_. He was remarkably humane and charitable; and, though poor, was a bold and avowed enemy to every species of oppression.... Certain it is, that he accounted the murder (as he called it) of the meanest animal, except in self defence, a very criminal breach of the laws of nature; insisting that the creator of all things had constituted man not the _tyrant_, but the lawful and limited _sovereign_, of the inferior animals, who, he contended, answered the ends of their being better than their little despotic lord.... He did not think it

‘Enough
In this late age, advent’rous to have touched
Light on the precepts of the Samian Sage,’

for he acted in strict conformity with them.... His vegetable and milk diet afforded him, in particular, very sufficient nourishment; for when I last saw him, he was still a tall, robust, and rather corpulent man, though upwards of fourscore.” He was reported it seems, to be a believer in the _Metempsychosis_. “It was probably so said,” remarks Ritson, “by ignorant people who cannot distinguish justice or humanity from an absurd and impossible system. The compiler of the present book, like Pythagoras and John Williamson, abstains from flesh-food, but he does not believe in the _Metempsychosis_, and much doubts whether it was the _real_ belief of either of those philosophers.”--_Abstinence from Animal Food a Moral Duty_, by Joseph Ritson. R. Phillips, London, 1802.

[214] In a sketch of the life of George Nicholson, contributed to a Manchester journal, by Mr. W. E. A. Axon.

[215] Perhaps the fallacy of this line of apology, on the part of the ordinary dietists, cannot be better illustrated than by the example of the man-eating tribes of New Zealand, Central Africa, and other parts of the world, who confessedly are (or were) _hominivorous_, and who have been by travellers quoted as some of the finest races of men on the globe. The “wholesome nutriment” of their human food was as forcible an argument for their stomach as the “agreeable flavour” was attractive for their palates. Such glaring fallacy might be illustrated further by the example of the man-eating tiger who, we may justly imagine, would use similar apologies for his practice.

[216] _On the Conduct, &c._, and _The Primeval Diet of Man_, &c., by George Nicholson, Manchester and London, 1797, 1801. The author assumes as his motto for the title-page the words of Rousseau--_Hommes, soyez humains! C’est votre premier devoir. Quelle sagesse y a-t-il pour vous hors de l’humanité?_ “Humans, be _humane_! It is your first duty. What wisdom is there for you without humanity?”

[217] _Surgical Observations on Tumours._ John Abernethy, M.D., F.R.C.S.

[218] Excessive poverty of blood, it is obvious to remark, is caused, not by abstaining from flesh but by abstaining from a _sufficient_ amount of _nutritious_ non-flesh foods.

[219] _Additional Reports_, 1814. Amongst valuable diagnoses of this kind the reader may be referred in particular to the highly interesting one of the Rev. C. H. Collyns, M.A., Oxon, which originally appeared in the _Times_ newspaper, and which twice has been republished by the Vegetarian Society. The success of the pure regimen in first mitigating and, finally, in altogether subduing long-inherited gouty affections, was complete and certain. The recently published evidence of the President of the newly-formed French Society, Dr. A. H. de Villeneuve, is equally satisfactory. (See _Bulletin de la Société Végétarienne_ of Paris, as quoted in _Nature_, Jan., 1881.)

[220] See, too, the testimony of Newton, _Return to Nature_, and of Shelley in his _Essay on the Vegetable Diet_, in which he describes these children as “the most beautiful and healthy beings it is possible to conceive. The girls are the most perfect models for a sculptor. Their dispositions, also, are the most gentle and conciliating.”

[221] _The Life of William Lambe, M.D., Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians._ By E. Hare, C.S.I., Inspector-General of Hospitals, to which valuable biography we are indebted for the present sketch. In Mr. Hare’s memoir will be found, among other testimonies to the truths of Vegetarianism, a highly-interesting letter, written to him by his friend Dr. H. G. Lyford, an eminent physician of Winchester.

[222] _Life of Shelley_, by Jefferson Hogg, quoted by Mr. Hare in Life of Dr. Lambe. Hogg adds that he conformed for good fellowship, and found the purer food an agreeable change.

[223] See the _Dietetic Reformer and Vegetarian Messenger_, August, 1873.

[224] _Pythagoran, Anytique reum, doctumque Platona_: “Pythagoras and the Man accused by Anytus [Socrates] and the learned Plato.”--_Satires_ of Horace.

[225] This is, perhaps, scarcely just to Pythagoras and his school. It is, without doubt, deeply to be lamented that they did not more widely promulgate a doctrine of such vital importance to the world; but the reasons of their reserve and partial reticence have been indicated already in our notice of the founder of _Akreophagy_. In a word--like the Founder of Christianity in a later age--they had many things to say which the world could not then learn. Moreover, as Gleïzès remarks, the teachers themselves could not have, from the nature of the case, the full knowledge of later times.

[226] The eloquence and style of Buffon, it need scarcely be remarked, are more indisputable than his scientific accuracy. Amongst his many errors, none, however, is more surprising than his assertion of the carnivorous anatomical organisation of man, which has been corrected over and over again by physiologists and _savants_ more profound than Buffon.

[227] “_Lachrymas--nostri pars optima sensus._”

[228] In newly-discovered countries, no decided predominance of one species over another has been found; and the reason is, that qualities are pretty nearly equally divided, and that the strongest animal is not at the same time the most agile or the most intelligent.--_Note_ by Gleïzès.

[229] Upon this, not the least interesting and important of the side views of Vegetarianism, we refer our readers, amongst numerous authorities, to the opinions of Paley, Adam Smith, Prof. Newman, Liebig, and W. R. Greg (in _Social Problems_).

[230] That the victims of the Slaughter-House have, in fact, a full presentiment of the fate in store for them, must be sufficiently evident to every one who has witnessed a number of oxen or sheep driven towards the scene of slaughter--the frantic struggles to escape and rush past the horrible locality, the exertions necessary on the part of the drovers or slaughtermen to force them to enter as well as the frequent breaking away of the maddened victim--maddened alike by the blows and clamours of its executioners and the presentiment of its destiny--who frantically rushes through the public streets and scatters the terrified human passengers--all this abundantly proves the transparent falsity of the assertion of the unconsciousness or indifference of the victims of the shambles. See a terribly graphic description of a scene of this kind in _Household Words_, No. 14, quoted in _Dietetic Reformer_ (1852), in _Thalysie_, and in the _Dietetic Reformer_, _passim_. Also in _Animal World_, &c., &c.

[231] _Thalysie: ou La Nouvelle Existence_: Par J. A. Gleïzès. Paris, 1840, in 3 vols., 8vo. See also preface to the German version of R. Springer, Berlin, 1872. Our English readers will be glad to learn that a translation by the English Vegetarian Society is now being contemplated.

[232] _Poeta_, in its original Greek meaning, marks out a _creator_ of new, and, therefore, (it is presumable) true ideas.

[233] Compare the fate of Gibbon, who, at the same age, found himself an outcast from the University for a very opposite offence--for having embraced the dogmas of Catholicism. (See _Memoirs of my Life and Writings_, by Edw. Gibbon.) The future historian of _The Decline and Fall_, it may be added, speedily returned to Protestantism, though not to that of his preceptors.