HIGHER LAWS. 
231 
were served up, I can speak from an unusually complete 
experience. The practical objection to animal food in 
my case was its uncleanness; and, besides, when I had 
caught and cleaned and cooked and eaten my fish, they 
seemed not to have fed me essentially. It was insignifi¬ 
cant and unnecessary, and cost more than il came to. 
A little bread or a few potatoes would have done as 
well, with less trouble and filth. Like many of my 
contemporaries, I had rarely for many years used ani¬ 
mal food, or tea, or coffee, &c.; not so much because of 
any ill effects which I had traced to them, as because they 
were not agreeable to my imagination. The repugnance to 
animal food is not the effect of experience, but is an in¬ 
stinct. It appeared more beautiful to live low and fare 
hard in many respects; and though I never did so, I 
went far enough to please my imagination. I believe 
that every man who has ever been earnest to preserve 
his higher or poetic faculties in the best condition has 
been particularly inclined to abstain from animal food, 
and from much food of any kind. It is a significant 
fact, stated by entomologists, I find it in Kirby and 
Spence, that “ some insects in their perfect state, though 
furnished with organs of feeding, make no use of them ; ” 
and they lay it down as “ a general rule, that almost all 
insects in this state eat much less than in that of larvae. 
The voracious caterpillar when transformed into a but¬ 
terfly,” . . “and the gluttonous maggot when become 
a fly,” content themselves with a drop or two of honey 
or some other sweet liquid. The abdomen under the 
wings of the butterfly still represents the larva. This 
is the tid-bit which tempts his insectivorous fate. The 
gross feeder is a man in the larva state; and there are 
