this cause the memorable plague at Athens
was attributed; and indeed all the other plagues and epidemical
distempers, of which we have any faithful accounts, will be found to
have originated in a deprivation of vegetable food.

"The only objections I have ever heard urged (the only plausible ones,
he must mean, I think), is the notion of its inadequacy to the
sustenance of the body. But this is merely a strong prejudice into which
the generality of mankind have fallen, owing to their ignorance of the
laws of life and health. Agility and constant vigor of body are the
effect of health, which is much better preserved by a herbaceous,
aqueous, and sparing tender diet, than by one which is fleshy, vinous,
unctuous, and hard of digestion.

"So fully were the Romans, at one time, persuaded of the superior
goodness of vegetable diet, that, besides the private example of many of
their great men, they established laws respecting food, among which were
the _lex fannia_, and the _lex licinia_, which allowed but very little
animal food; and, for a period of five hundred years, diseases were
banished along with the physician from the Roman empire. Nor has our own
age been destitute of examples of men, brave from the vigor both of
their bodies and their minds, who at the same time have been drinkers of
water and eaters of vegetables.[12]

"Nothing is more certain than that animal food is inimical to health.
This is evident from its stimulating qualities producing, as it were, a
temporary fever after every meal; and not only so, but from its
corruptible qualities it gives rise to many fatal diseases; and those
who indulge in its use seldom arrive at an advanced age.

"We have the authority of the Scripture for asserting that the proper
aliment of man is vegetables. See Genesis. And as disease is not
mentioned as a part of the cause, we have reason to believe that the
antediluvians were strangers to this evil. Such a phenomenon as disease
could hardly exist among a people who lived entirely on a vegetable
food; consequently all the individuals made mention of in that period of
the world, are said to have died of old age; whereas, since the day of
Noah, when mankind were permitted to eat animal food, such an occurrence
as a man dying of old age, or a natural decay of the bodily functions,
does not occur probably once in half a century.

"Its injurious effects on the mind are equally certain. The Tartars, who
live principally on an