HISTORICAL ASPECTS OF VEGETARIANISM. 459 



The germs of misery, death, disease and crime. 

 No longer now the winged habitants. 

 That in the woods their sweet lives sing away, 

 Flee from the form of man, ... 



All things are void of terror; man has lost 



His terrible prerogative, and stands 



An equal amidst equals. Happiness 



And science dawn though late upon the earth; 



Peace cheers the mind, health renovates the frame. 



Lord Byron evidently believed that flesh eating excites men to war 

 and bloodshed ; thus he testifies in ' Don Jnan ' ( Canto II. ) : 



Tliat Pasiphae promoted breeding cattle. 

 To make the Cretans bloodier in battle. 



For we all know that English people are 



Fed upon beef — I won't say much of beer 

 Because 'tis liquor only, and being far 



From this my subject, has no business here: 

 We know, too, they are very fond of war, 



A pleasure — like all pleasures — rather dear; 

 So were the Cretans — from which I infer. 

 That beef and battles both were owing to her. 



The beginning of the modern vegetarian movement is usually dated 

 from the publication of an essay entitled : ' Eeturn to nature, or defence 

 of vegetable regime/ by I. Newton (London, 1811). To the influence 

 of this, the formation of the first vegetarian society by Joseph Simpson 

 in Manchester, England, in 1847, is ascribed; and so far as I am aware 

 the word vegetarian was coined at this time. A similar society is re- 

 ported to have been formed in the United States in 1850. The use 

 of a vegetable diet had, however, been advocated and practised over a 

 century before, as the following extract from Benjamin Franklin's 

 autobiography testifies. Eef erring to about the year 1722 he said: 



When about sixteen years of age, I happened to meet with a book, written 

 by one Tryon, recommending a vegetable diet. I determined to go into it. My 

 brother, being yet unmarried, did not keep house, but boarded himself and his 

 apprentices in another family. My refusing to eat flesh occasioned an incon- 

 venience, and I was frequently chid for my singularity. I made myself ac- 

 quainted with Tryon's manner of preparing some of his dishes, such as boiling 

 potatoes or rice, making hasty-pudding and a few others, and then proposed 

 to my brother, that if he would give me weekly half the money he paid for 

 my board, I would board myself. He instantly agreed to it, and I presently 

 found that I could save half what he paid me. This was an additional fund 

 for buying of books; but I had another advantage in it. My brother and the 

 rest going from the printing house to their meals, I remained there alone, and, 

 dispatching presently my light repast (which was often no more than a biscuit, 

 or a slice of bread, a handful of raisins, or a tart from the pastry cook's, and 

 a glass of water) J had the rest of the time till their return for study; in 

 which I made the greater progress from that greater clearness of head and 

 quicker apprehension, which generally attend temperance in eating and drink- 



