with vegetable nutriment, and whose nurse, allfo, fhould live entirely on vegetables, would ever be fubject to worms.' "Under their abftemious mortifying diet, the Bannians maintain as good a habit of body, are: as comely and proportionable as other people, and live to reckon as many years as those that pity their fpare food. But, in their thoughts, they are often more quick and nimble, by that courfe of liveing they choose to delight in, which renders their spirits more pure and subtle, and thereby greatly facilitates their comprehenfion of things. In a word, they keep their organs clear, their fpirits lively, and their conftitutions free from thofe diseafees, which a grofser diet is apt to create in these warm climates."t The common diet of the Otaheiteans is made up of, at least, nine tenths of vegetable food; and it is, perhap, oweing to this temperate course of life, that they have fo few diseafees. They * Emilius, 1, 54. "Can it be fuppofe'd that a vegetable diet should be the beft adapted for a child, and animal food for its nurfe? There is an evident contradiction in the notion." Ibi, 56. "Nor is this to be wonder'd at, fince animal fubftancecs, when putrefy'd, are cover'd with worms, in a manner never experience'd in the substance of vegetables." Ibi, 53. +Ovingtons Voyage to Suratt, p. 317. Cook's Voyages, II, 148. feldom eat flesh; their children, and young girls, never any; and this, doubtless, ferves to keep them free from all our diseafees.* Nothing, in fact, is fo light and easey to the stomach, most certainly, as the farinaceous or mealy vegetables; fuch as peafe, beans, millet, oats, barley, rye, wheat, fago, rice, potatos, and the like; but bread, after all, is the lightest · and properest aliment for human bodys.‡ That a vegetable diet promotes longevity is inferable from feveral inftanceës. The great Aurungzebe, from his ufurpation of the throne, never tasteëd flesh, fish, nor strong liquors, and live'd in good health to near a hundred years. That of old Parr, who dyed at the age of 152 years and 9 months, was old cheese, milk, coarse bread, small-beer, and whey: and his historian tels us, he might have live'd a good while longer, if he had not change'd his diet and air.§ Old Henry Welby, who live'd at his house, in Grubftreet, forty-four years, unfeen by any, did not, in all that space, tafte either flesh or fish. He dye'd in 1636, aged 84. In July 1737, was *Bougainvilles Voyage. + Cheynes Esfay on bealth, p. 65. Dr. Arbuthnots Essay concerning aliments, p. 51. See Morgans Phoenix Britannicus, p. 369. liveing in St. Margarets work-houfe, Weftminster, Mary Patten, age'd 136 years, whose onely food was milk.* On the 25th of December 1772, dye'd at Brusfels, age'd 101, Elifabeth de Val, who never ate a bit of flesh, or tasteed of any kind of broth or foup, dureing the whole course of her life.t A few years ago, dye'd at Coombe in Northhumberland, Jofeph Ekins, age'd 103; who never knew a weeks ilness, and subsisted entirely on bread, milk, and vegetables, for the last thirty years. fhepherd dye'd, not long fince, at Gompas, in Hungary, in the 126th year of his age. His manner of liveing was extremely fimple: he never ate any meat, but subsisted entirely on milk, butter, and cheese, and had never been il in his life.§ A One great advantage, according to doctor Cheyne, a vegetable diet has over an animal one, is, that, in the weakeft digestions, and the most dangerous and obftinate distempers, the patient may allways fil his belly, and fatisfy his hunger, * Gentlemans Magazine, VII, 449. The trustees, it is fay'd, had her picture painted, to fucceed her when the dye'd. + Scots Magazine, XXXIV, 696. From a newspaper. § Morning poft, January 28, 1800, 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 philosophical reason, why vegetable food, he says, 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 pafs 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 diseaféës. 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 say'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 physicians 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 rest being but trifleing, he proceeds as follows: But people think they cannot poffiblely fubfist 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 mass of mankind are necesfaryly confine'd to this diet, or pretty nearly to it; and yet live with the ufe of their fenfeës, limbs, and facultys, without diseafeës, or but few, and thofe from accidents or epidemical caufees, and that there have been *Natural method of cureing diseases, p. 68. 70. |