"Position IV.—With about equal potency alcohol and flesh meats weaken the force of the capillaries of the system, on which healthy action so much depends.
"Position V.—A flesh diet, in common with the use of strong drink, impairs the tone of the nutritive apparatus, by which its ability to work up raw material and manufacture it into sound, well finished vital fabric, is diminished, and of course the appetite or call for food is satisfied with a less quantity of the raw material. This fact has given rise to the opinion that animal food contains more nutriment than vegetable.
"Position VI.—The total abandonment of an habitual use of animal food is attended with all the perplexing, uncomfortable, and distressing difficulties that follow the giving up of an habitual use of strong drink. A change from one kind of simple nutriment to another has no such effect. It is only when the constant use of some stimulating substance is abandoned that such difficulties are experienced."
DR. JARVIS.
This gentleman, in his "Practical Physiology," at page 86, has the following thoughts:
"Some have contended that man was designed to eat only of the fruits and vegetables of the earth; while others maintain, with equal confidence, that he should add to these the flesh of beasts. There are many individuals, both in this and other countries, who confine themselves to vegetable diet. They believe they enjoy better health, and maintain greater strength of body and mind, than those who live on a mixed diet. The experiment has not been tried on a sufficiently extensive range to determine its value. It has not proved a failure, nor has it demonstrated, to the satisfaction of all, that flesh is injurious."[14]
DR. TICKNOR.
"From the fact," says this author, "that animal food is proper and necessary for health in polar regions, and that a vegetable diet is equally proper and necessary in the torrid zone, we may conclude that in winter, in our own climate, an animal diet is the best; while vegetables are more conducive to health in the summer season."
It would not be difficult to prove, from the very concessions of Dr. T., that vegetable food is better adapted to health, in general, than animal; but I forbear to do so, in this place. The subject will be fully discussed in the concluding chapter.