30 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



ARTICLES OF FOOD, 



From an Address before the Middlesex North Agricultural Society, Sept. IG, 1857. 



BY E. F. SHERMAN. 



The comparative value of animal and vegetable food has been 

 a frequent source of discussion and contention. Men who have 

 contended for an exclusively vegetable diet, have been, in gen- 

 eral, men of weak stomachs, if not of weak heads ; dyspeptics 

 and grumblers, who, having suffered long from sour stomachs, 

 have become soured- throughout. But they have in vain 

 attempted to support their theories against the deductions of 

 the anatomist, the natural instincts and appetites of man, 

 every where, and the divine permission to " slay and eat." 

 Either an exclusively vegetable or animal diet is capable of 

 sustaining life, but the most perfect development, physical and 

 intellectual, has always existed wdiere sustenance has been 

 derived from both sources. 



It is hardly possible to name any thing belonging to the 

 animal or the vegetable kingdom, not absolutely poisonous, 

 which has not at some time been eaten ; nor can any animal be 

 named, the use of which, as food, has not at some time, and 

 by some national religion or habit, been proliiI)ited. We are 

 sickened when we consider what gross and loathsome articles 

 are considered delicacies ])y tliosc who, could they to-day have 

 come to these tables, would not have found one thing here, in 

 their judgment, fit to be eaten. Truly, one-half of the world 

 knows not how the other half lives. Wliat is oue man's meat 

 is another's poison. In nothing are the inconsistencies of our 

 race so strikingly exhibited as in national and individual habits 

 and ])rcjudices respecting food. 



A slight consideration of our own peculiarities, individual 

 and national, with regard to diet, will lead us to be charitable 



