"Has god, thou fool! work'd folely for thy good,
Thy joy, thy pastime, thy attire, thy food?
Who for thy table feeds the wanton fawn,
For him as kindly spread the flow'ry lawn.
Is it for thee the lark ascends and fings?
Joy tunes his voice, joy elevates his wings:
Is it for thee the linnet pours his throat?
Loves of his own and raptures fwel the note:
The bounding fteed, you pompously beftride,
Shares with his lord the pleasure and the pride:
Is thine alone the feed that ftrews the plain?
The birds of heaven fhal vindicate their grain :
Thine the ful harveft of the golden year?
Part pays, and juftly, the deserveing steer:
The hog, that plows not nor obeys thy call,
Lives on the labours of this lord of all.

"Know, Natures children all divide her care; The fur that warms a monarch, warm'd a bear. While man exclaims, "See all things for my ufe!" "See man for mine!" replys a pamper'd goofe; And just as fhort of reafon he must fall,

Who thinks all made for one, not one for all.

"Nor think, in NATURES STATE they blindly trod;

The ftate of nature was the reign of god:
Self-love and focial at her birth began,
Union the bond of all things, and of man.
Pride then was not; nor arts, that pride to aid;
Man walk'd with beaft, joint tenant of the fhade;
The fame his table, and the fame his bed;
No murder clothe'd him, and no murder fed....
Ah! how unlike the man of times to come!
Of half that live the butcher and the tomb;
Who, foe to nature, hears the general groan,
Murders their fpecies, and betrays his own.

But juft disease to luxury fucceeds,
And every death its own avengeër breeds;
The fury-pasfions from that blood began,
And turn'd on man a fierceër favage, man.' "*

* Popes Essay on man, epis. iii, v. 12, Ta.

CHAP. III.

ANIMAL FOOD NOT NECESSARY FOR THE PURPOSE OF STRENGTH OR CORPULENCY.

AMONG the many pretenceës to which men are driveën to defend or palliate a practice at which human nature, when divefted of the habits and prejudiceës of fociety, would not fail to revolt, it is not one of the leaft trite and hackney'd, that, to fuch as are compel'd or accustom'd to a laborious or active life, animal food is abfolutely necesfary, without which they would be allmoft, if not alltogether, unable to discharge the dutys require'd in their respective ftations. This, however, like the reft, is a mere naked asfertion; for which, at least, the onely argument that can be adduce'd is that men ufe'd to hard labour, or uncommon exertions, require a greater proportion of food, and that, perhap, of a more nutritive or fubftantial nature,

than those who are not: which, though an indisputable fact, wil, by no means, prove what it is brought to do.

Evidence of a fatisfactory and convinceing nature has been allready adduce'd that, in what are call'd the early agees of mankind, the use of animal food was totally unknown; and that, in fome countrys, it remains fo to this day: whence they are univerfally fuppofe'd to have been, at that period, a more ftout, healthy, robuft and active race, than has ever exifted fince animal food was adopted.

Gluttony, luxury, and prejudice, no doubt, are not to be reafon'd with. It may, however, be demonftrateëd, that a vegetable diet is, fo far from being lefs, even much more, favorable and conducive to ftrength and vigour than animal food. It is wel known to be not the quantity of any thing takeën into the ftomach, but the degree of nutriment derive'd from it, the quantity of chyle takeën up by the lacteals, and thence transmited into the fystem, to which the body is indebted for ftrength and vigour. That fpecies of food, therefor, of which a giveën quantity producees the greatest proportion of chyle, muft, of courfe, be the moft nutritious and invigorateing: and this appears to be the

cafe with good wheaten-bread; which is so justly term'd the staf of life, as being fufficient for all its purpofeës. "Some," fays doctor Cheyne, "have affirm'd, that nothing but folid food can nourish, and that broths, foups, milk, and fuch aqueous food, weaken, wafte and liquefy, the constitution and habit: but these are poor philofophers; for, in truth and realty, no food can nourish, i. e. increase the quantity of flesh and blood, [and] fupply the wafte of action and liveing, and the necessary fecretions, but what is liquid and extremely thin, and whey wil nourish more quickly than beef, though not fo durerablely, as is known to every one who underftands the animal economy. Let one swallow down what he wil, that part of it which nourish'd must be thiner and more fluid than the whey of affes milk; nay, posfiblely, as thin as vapour, else it can never enter the lacteals (the onely pasfageës by which nourishment, or new chyle can get into the blood), or, at least, pass through fome of the extremely minute canals, much less than a hair: the reft onely fcratches [or tickles] the palate, and the organs of fenfe, and poisons the world afterward."*

* Method of cure, p. 226.