Vegetarianism | AdventAI

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jun 4, 1885

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 22.

Vegetarianism.

It does not seem long since the question of vegetarian diet was treated by most people either as a great joke or an amiable weakness. The idea of sustaining a vigorous physique upon a diet which excluded animal food was formerly scouted as unworthy of sensible people; and yet it has come to pass that many who cannot be charged with weakness either of body or of mind now look with great favor upon the system which seeks physical sustenance rather in the vegetable than in the animal world. In many of our large towns—Birmingham among the number—accommodation is provided whereby a choice meal may be secured, composed almost entirely of vegetables; and, undoubtedly, the system is growing in public acceptance. . . . The heavily-increased demands which recent years have made upon the resources of the grazier and the butcher have produced a price for flesh meat which is practically prohibitive to many classes of the population. A working man with a large family cannot possibly provide his family with beef and mutton with any regularity, as things go to-day; and if it can be proved that vegetables can supply the lack, with due regard to public health, a most trying problem in economics will have been partially solved. The same argument will apply to young men and youths employed in large towns, to whom the price of their daily dinner is a growing difficulty.—Birmingham (Eng.) Gazette.