p. 13 | Humanity and Diet by Ernest Bell

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jul 28, 1903

Humanity and Diet

By Ernest Bell

MANY persons are shocked at the cruelties involved in the fattening and slaughtering of cattle, pigs, and poultry for the production of meat, and would like to be vegetarians, at any rate in as far as abstinence from butchers' meat is concerned, but they do not know how to begin. They have grown up in the belief that meat is necessary to health, and foresee great difficulties where, in fact, none exist. The chief difficulty in becoming a vegetarian is in reality one of mind rather than body. The first essential is to have the wish. If there is a real wish, all supposed obstacles may easily be overcome; while on the other hand, if there is only a passing fancy, a score of reasons for giving up the experiment will soon be found.

Let us assume that some of our readers really wish to live without meat, and are willing to make some slight sacrifice in order to do so; the second important part is that they should have the belief that they can do so. In this, as in other matters, those who have no doubt have also no difficulty, while those who are timid and nervous see and feel difficulties at every turn, and never succeed.

A great step is gained if you can only realize that in giving up meat you are not doing anything at all extraordinary. Most of us must have known cases of cats and dogs, animals purely carnivorous by nature, that have learned to live in perfect health on a diet with no meat in it. How much more, then, should we, who have never been wholly carnivorous, be able to live healthfully without meat? The greatest meat eater is, after all, already more than half a vegetarian.

Many millions of people—some say more than half the population of the world—are at the present time living without meat in their diet, no less healthfully and happily than others. Until a few years ago, both in England and on the Continent, the classes who have done the hard work for the community have lived almost without flesh food except perhaps once a week, at the Sunday dinner. All the animals which supply mankind with sustained power—the elephant, camel, reindeer, ox, and horse—are purely vegetarians. Some of the greatest intellects the world has seen, have, at any rate for part of their lives, been vegetarians, as Plato, Newton, Shelley. The victims of the sweaters' den, with sixteen hours' work a day, and not much more than half that number of shillings a week, can afford no meat, but carry on their grinding work for years before they succumb. In face of these facts it is simply ridiculous to assert that our bodies can not be nourished without the sacrifice of animal life.

Looking at the workers of the world, we might almost say that the necessity for animal food and the amount consumed is in direct proportion—not to the work done, but to the leisure and idleness of those who suffer from this supposed necessity. When we are told, as we often are, that “it may suit some people, but I am sure it would not suit me,” we know that unfortunately this is quite true; but it is not the body that presents any difficulty, but the mind that is at fault—often, it is to be feared, hopelessly so.

If, then, the reader really wishes to abstain from meat, and also realizes that he can perfectly well do so if he likes, a very few practical hints will suffice to start him on his way. If his faith is strong, he will merely give up the meat and eat the other things.

A good deal of nonsense is talked about people being unable to change after they have attained middle age. There might be truth in this in the case of purely carnivorous animals, but with creatures frugivorous by nature, and always more or less vegetarian by habit, the change can be made at any time if the mind is in it.

That some people can not digest or assimilate some vegetarian foods is obvious, but if that is an argument against the bloodless diet, then the fact that some meat eaters can take mutton but can not digest beef or pork is also an argument against all meat eating. There is ample variety in the vegetable world to suit all constitutions and all well-trained palates.

It may be well to bear in mind,—

1. That most people eat more than is necessary for, or conducive to, health and strength.

2. That in their fear lest they should starve, many would-be vegetarians make themselves ill by taking too much of the more stimulating foods, such as peas, beans, lentils, nuts, and grains.

3. That fruits are not merely adjuncts to substantial food, but are themselves substantial articles of diet. It is quite possible to sustain healthy life solely on some fruits.

4. That the 'craving' for meat, like the craving for drink, is not an indication of the necessity for it. It is a morbid condition of mind and body, mainly the former, and will pass off under healthier conditions if the will is exercised as it should be in the matter.—Ernest Bell, in the Animals' Friend.