without fear, remorfe, or fuffering; at least, he may do it to a great degree, til he comes to be. far advance'd in years: and, if he should hapen, at any time, to exceed, he feels none of thofe pungent and acute fymptoms, nor those dureable effects, and profound finkings, he would feel from a full meal of high meats, and strong drinks...... A plain, natural, and philofophical reason, why vegetable food, he fays, is preferable to all other, is, that, abounding with few or no falts, being foft and cool, and confifting of parts that are easeyly divideëd and form'd into chyle, without giveing any labour to the digestive powers, it has not that force to open the mouths of the lacteals, to distend their orificeës, and excite them to an unnatural activity, to let pass too great a quantity of hot and rank chyle into the blood, and fo overcharge, and inflame, the lymphaticks, and capillarys, which is the natural, and ordinary, effect of animal food, and, therefor, cannot fo readyly produce diseafeës. Such food, he continues, requires little or no force of digestion, a little gentle heat and motion being fufficient to disfolve it into its integral particles, and into a thin watery emulfion, fuch as is chicken-water, afs's milk, or thin broth, which is all that is require'd for the purpose of nutrition,

5

and all of the food that can enter into the lacteals.....fo that no more being admited into the blood than the expenceës of liveing require, life and health can never be endanger'd on a vegetable diet. But all the contrary hapens under a high animal diet.*

Haveing allready fay'd, that real lunacy, madnefs, and a disorder'd brain, can posfiblely be accounted for from no other natural cause but a mal-regimen of diet; and that the best phyficians have no other method of cureing fuch diseafeës, but great, proper, and frequent evacuations of all kinds, and then braceing by vegetables, astringents, or cold baths, all the reft being but trifleing, he proceeds as follows: But people think they cannot poffiblely fubfift on a little meat, milk, and vegetables, or any low diet, and that they must infalliblely perish if they be confine'd to water onely; not confidering that nine parts in ten of the whole mafs of mankind are necesfaryly confine'd to this diet, or pretty nearly to it; and yet live with the use of their fenfees, limbs, and facultys, without diseafeës, or but few, and those from accidents or epidemical caufees, and that there have been

Natural method of cureing diseases, p. 68. 70.

nations, and now are numbers of tribes, who voluntaryly confine themselves to vegetables onely... and there are whole villageës in this kingdom who scarce eat animal food, or drink fermented liquors a dozen times a year.....The onely conclufion, he fays, i would draw from thefe historical facts, is, that a low diet, or liveing on vegetables, wil not deftroy life or health, or cause nervous and cephalick distempers; but, on the contrary, cure them as far as they are cureable..... But this i pretend to demonstrate from thefe facts, that abstinence and a low diet is the great antidote and univerfal remedy of distempers acquire'd by excefs, intemperance, and a mistakeën regimen of high meats and drinks; that it wil greatly alleviate, and render tolerable, the original distempers derive'd from diseafe'd parents; and that it is abfolutely necessary for the deep-thinking part of mankind, who would. preferve their facultys, ripe and pregnant, to a green old age, and to the last dregs of life; and that it is the true and real antidote and prefervative from wrong-headedness, irregular, and disorderly, intellectual functions, from lofs of the rational facultys, memory, and fenfees, and from all nervous distempers, as far as the ends of pro

vidence, and the condition of mortality, wil allow.*

great

"Who is there that does not know how a part cacao-beans make of the food of the inhabitants in the country where they grow; and how foon people of wafteëd and reduce'd conftitutions, by means of them, recover their flesh and ftrength? Nay, we have an instance of a ships crew, which, for two months, had nothing but chocolate for their food, and were very hearty and wel with it."†

"The utility of a diet confifting entirely of vegetables in the hypochondriafis, obftinate gouts, and other stubborn and pertinacious disorders, has of late been place'd in a very clear light by doctor W. Grant, in his "Esfay on the atrabilious conftitution," (p. 399, &c.) in which instanceës are giveën of its haveing not onely greatly improve'd the patients health, and giveën them fresh strength and vigour, but made them, as it were, younger than before."+

"The native Javanese derive one advantage, at least, from an atmosphere not subject to the

* Ibi, p. 90.

Sparrians Voyage, II, 231.

+ Ibi, 236.

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vicisitudes of temperature experience'd in the northern parts of Europe, where diseafees of the teeth are chiefly prevalent; as they are at Batavia entirely exempt from fuch complaints. Their habit of liveing chiefly on vegetable food, and of abftaining from fermented liquors, no doubt contributes to this exemption."*

Sir G. Stauntons Account of an embassy to China, I, 251.