John Eyton Bickersteth Mayor

“ The thinner my diet is, the easier, more cheerful and lightsome, I find myself; my sleep is also the sounder, though perhaps somewhat shorter than formerly under my full animal diet. But, then, I am more alive than ever I was, as soon as I awake and get up. I rise commonly at six, and go to bed at ten. The order I find in this diet, from much experience, is, that milk is the lightest and best of all foods, being a medium between animal substances and vegetables; dressed vegetables, less windy and griping than raw; ripe fruit than unripe ”

“ As happens in nineteen cases out of twenty, [3] my young and blooming Vegetarian replied that she took an egg and milk in quantity, besides butter, not only at breakfast, but again in the form of pastry, fritter, or cake, &c., to say nothing of cheese at each of the two subsequent meals of the day—animal food, it is unnecessary to say, of a choice, and some of it in a concentrated form. To call a person thus fed a Vegetarian is a palpable error; to proclaim oneself so almost requires a stronger term to denote the departure from accuracy involved. ”

“ No man ever summoned me to eat antiquities, or in a literal sense to become heluo librorum. Why, in the name of wonder, should an eminent surgeon let slip the dogs of scorn and indignation upon me, and call me in effect a liar, if, as a Vegetarian, I use the liberty allowed by my profession, and return sometimes to the diet of my cradle? ”

“ Yet, in fact, few Vegetarians do confine themselves to this diet; and herein consists my difficulty in definition. We are open to the scoff of being, not Vegetarians but Brahmins, who do not object to animal food, but only to the taking of animal life. Few of us refuse eggs, or milk and its products. This is highly illogical, if we seek consistency with an abstract theory. I do not shut my eyes to it. The truth is, that in cookery we need some grease, and it is hard to eat dry bread without butter or cheese. Our climate does not produce the nicer oils. ”

“ Grant them that conscious life is a boon to its possessors. The "mixed feeder," in a civilised society, at all events, ought to be aware that he is not the mere occasion of death to animals, but is, on the other hand, promoting life by propagating them for the purpose of food, and that he may conscientiously feel pleasure in the fact that he plays a humble part in promoting the happiness of his fellow creatures by furthering the great scheme which has associated joy with life. ”

“ The limits within which the dietary of the Vegetarian Society was restricted excluded nothing but the flesh and blood of animals. To have made the conditions of membership more exclusive would have greatly impaired the usefulness of the Society. Judging of the Vegetarians as a body, therefore, their principles and practice were not inconsistent with each other, their rules expressing their principles, and the consistency of individuals should be judged of by the opinions they privately entertained. ”

“ Recurring to the inconsistency of milk and eggs with strict Vegetarianism, I will observe that, by the avowal of medical science, milk has none of the inflammatory properties of flesh-meat; in so far it is akin to Vegetarian food. But undoubtedly the pressure of dense population for milk is an evil, and tends to the adulteration of the milk, to a deterioration of it, by giving to the cow whatever will increase its quantity, and to an enfeebling of cows generally, by asking too much milk of them, and by breeding them too quickly. ”

“ We should like to know who may most consistently place omelets and egg fritters upon his table—the man who believes that the Creator intended him to eat the products of animal as well as of vegetable life, or he who maintains that the welfare of the human race, both physically, morally, and intellectually, is best consulted by a diet of fruit and farinacea? ”

“ Do Vegetarians take eggs, milk, cheese, butter, honey? Yes and no; some do, some do not. Officially, the Society proscribes fish, flesh, fowl. Outside the three F's, our members are free to range as other men; the Society is neutral. So the use of tobacco, tea, coffee, fermented drinks, is an open question with us. Yet very few Vegetarians use strong drinks or smoke. Many drink water only; some do not drink at all; the tendency is towards simplicity. Our action is providing substitutes for all animal substances. [4] A German firm advertises in our German organs vegetable milk and cheese. ”

“ It is not easy to buy oil delicate enough for food; and oil (to most Englishmen) is offensive, from tasting like degenerate butter. Cheese, like nuts, is maligned as indigestible, barely because it is heaped on a full stomach. However, since most Vegetarians admit eggs and milk, I define the diet as consisting of food which is substantially the growth of the earth without animal slaughter. ”

“ Blood, perhaps, is the most objectionable form of nutriment; flesh, being principally composed of blood, is next to it in its gross, stimulating, and exciting qualities; whilst eggs, cheese, butter, cream, and milk are less and less stimulating in the order in which they are here placed, approaching, as they do, to the qualities of vegetables and fruits. ”

“ Others, again, rejected animal food from their diet because, from a careful study of the organisation of man and from an unprejudiced investigation of anatomy and physiology, they saw plain indications that man had been specially adapted to a fruit and farinaceous diet, and inferred that, when climate and other circumstances permitted, an exclusive adoption of that diet would be most conducive to health, and, as far as food was concerned, to the highest development of which man was susceptible. ”

“ Yet so attractive to some possessing a moral sense not too punctilious is the small distinction attained by becoming sectarian and partisans of a quasi novel and somewhat questioned doctrine, that an equivocal position is accepted in order to retain, if possible, the term Vegetarian as the ensign of a party, the members of which consume abundantly strong animal food, abjuring it only in its grosser forms of flesh and fish. ”

“ He would, therefore, caution all Vegetarians against too free a use of them. They might be advisable at their banquets and soirées, to demonstrate to strangers and inquirers what an immense variety of rich and nutritious dishes could be produced without animal slaughter; they might also be used as a transition diet of which flesh formed no part, but when circumstances would permit, an entire rejection of whatever was not simple in composition would be undoubtedly an advantage with regard to health and economy, as some Vegetarians had already found. ”

“ Akin to us is that from plants, grains, and such other vegetable products as nourish man well; also what is derived from animals, not slaughtered, but otherwise serviceable. Of these foods the most suitable are such as we may use at once without fire, for such are readiest to hand. Such are fruits in season and some herbs, milk, cheese, and honeycombs. Moreover, such as need fire, and belong to the classes of grains and herbs, are also not unsuitable, but are all, without exception, akin to man. ”

“ Do not milk, butter, cheese, and eggs contain the same kind of matter as animal food does?" Strictly speaking, inasmuch as any article of food contains elements of nutrition, these elements are identical; but the form of the matter in which they are contained may be very different in producing or not the heating and stimulating effects which are opposed to the healthy condition of the body. Chemistry shews, moreover, that the elements of nutrition originate in vegetables. ”

“ It is most desirable, therefore, that an intelligible definition should be framed to indicate accurately the diet thus erroneously described as "Vegetarian," a term which denotes the consumption of food only obtained from the vegetable kingdom, and can by no possibility be accurately, that is, honestly, used to include anything else. ”

“ Some had become Vegetarians because they believed that God had forbidden man to kill animals and to feed upon their flesh and blood; others because they considered it inconsistent with the character of a moral, benevolent, and rational being, and contrary to the instinctive feeling of man, to kill and eat animals. If their inquiries proceeded no further than that, they might possibly consider milk, eggs, &c., as a necessary part of human diet ”

“ Having reviewed the physiological, chemical, and dietetic qualities of milk, having proved its richness in every constituent of animal flesh, we may fairly compliment our waggish friends, the Vegetarians, in having added to their vegetable bill-of-fare, milk and eggs, two of the best, most concentrated, and nutritious articles of human food. ”

“ I get on now first-rate, being able to regulate the action of my system like clock-work, and keep in excellent health, entirely without the use of medicine of any description; and altogether I feel in a blessed state of existence. I am more buoyant in spirits—more agile. My physical energy is increased, and altogether I enjoy a new life. ”

“ The name Vegetarian will probably stick to us; men do indeed laugh at it, because they understand by it only a plant-eater; but it has a very different meaning. For we derive the name from the Latin word vegetus, which signified among the Romans a man sound in body and intellect, brisk and energetic.
Our own magazine has not, I think, anywhere given the true etymology of our title. See Dietetic Reformer for 1880, pp. 27, 28:—
Mrs. Buxton speaks in one of her lectures as if she thought that Vegetarians were ignorant that milk and eggs, and cheese are animal products. ”

“ Can a man be called a Vegetarian who takes milk, butter, cheese, and eggs?" We beg to reply that the majority of Vegetarians partake of these articles, and that a few only do not, whilst all are alike denominated Vegetarians, the principle of the movement being simply to abstain from the flesh and blood of animals, which cannot be procured except by means of slaughter ”

“ When a medical man makes such a mistake, it is no wonder that other persons have strangely erroneous ideas as to our diet. This is one instance among hundreds by which the public are misled and deceived, it may be unwittingly, as to what Vegetarianism really is. Each member is left free to use milk, butter, eggs, and cheese, or not, as he may think proper. ”

“ Fish, flesh, fowl, soup, with stock, are refused as easily as cauliflowers or turnips ; but if I pry into every pudding or cake—"you are quite sure there is no milk, no eggs, no butter here?"—I become a nuisance. If ladies heap eggs on your plate, flattering themselves that they are saving you from starvation, who so stony-hearted as to undeceive them? It pleases them, and does no harm to you. In my rooms I never take milk, but at refreshment bars I encourage the demand as against alcohol ”

“ The Vegetarian, then, is one who aims at wholeness, soundness, strength, quickness, vigour, growth, wakefulness, health. These must be won by a return to nature, and the natural food for man is a diet of fruit and farinacea, with which some combine such animal products as may be enjoyed without destroying sentient life.
In the German journals of kindred societies the true derivation has frequently been insisted on. Eduard Baltzer's Vortrag über Vegetarianismus, am 27 Juni 1870 im sächischen Hof zu Nürnberg gehalten. ”

“ Many Vegetarians bear witness that abstinence from flesh, fish, and fowl restored them to health long unknown; they have not found it necessary to renounce milk and eggs for physical regeneration. Read the case of Mr. Collyns. One remark before leaving the dairy. Many of our critics forget that herbivorous and frugivorous, not less than carnivorous animals, suck the breast. No sane man ever denied that milk is a natural human food, at least for babes. ”

“ No one would lower the standard of Christian morals because of his inability to reach it in his present social position; nor should the Vegetarian flinch from the acknowledgement of his mental convictions with regard to the best and most natural food of man, although unfavorable conditions might, for the present, render the carrying out of them impracticable or inconvenient. ”

“ When, therefore, a Vegetarian advocated an exclusively fruit and farinaceous diet, he might take circumstances into consideration, and believe he had a right to make use of milk, eggs, &c., if he found it more convenient, more agreeable, or more to his advantage to do so. ”

“ But it is high time that we should be spared the obscure language, or rather the inaccurate statement to which milk and egg consumers are committed, in assuming a title which has for centuries belonged to that not inconsiderable body of persons whose habits of life confer the right to use it. And I feel sure that my friends "the Vegetarians," living on a mixed diet, will see the necessity of seeking a more appropriate designation to distinguish them ”

“ We repeat what is, no doubt, well known to some persons, that it is used for want of a better. Most Vegetarians use everything which others do, except flesh-meat, and food in the preparation of which lard, suet, or dripping may have been used. The proportion and quantity of vegetable productions, &c., which they use will, in many cases, be somewhat different. ”

“ For the breeding of animals of all kinds for human food confers life on millions of beings possessing considerable capacity for enjoyment in their own way, on the best conditions attainable; conditions far superior in point of comfort, freedom from pain, accident, &c., to those which govern the wild breeds inhabiting the prairie or the forest. ”

“ Now we know that the meagre or Lenten fare includes eggs, milk, butter, even fish. These rules of fasting are bequest of vast experience. They show that a low diet tends to mortify the flesh. Vegetarian testimony may not wholly bear out the strong assertion of Dr. Jas. C Jackson [11] :—
It is morally and physically impossible for any man to remain a drunkard who can be induced to forego the use of tobacco, tea, coffee, spicy condi ments, common salt, flesh meats, and medicinal drugs. But certainly the vast majority of Vegetarians are teetotalers, though bound by no official pledge. ”