had long been looking as the most promising for the mission work to
which he had devoted himself; and in this hope he had been sustained
by his Master. In the spring of 1817 a company of forty-one persons,
members of the Bible Christian community, embarked at Liverpool
for Philadelphia, They comprised two clerics--W. Metcalfe and Jas.
Clark--twenty other adults, and nineteen children. Of this band only a
part were able to resist the numerous temptations to conformity with
the prevalent social practices; and the vast distances which separated
the leaders from their followers were almost an insuperable bar to
sympathy and union. Settling in Philadelphia--for them at least a name
of real significance--Metcalfe supported his family by teaching, while
performing the duties of his position as head of the faithful few who
formed his church. His day-school, which was attended by the sons
of some of the leading people of the city, proved to be pecuniarily
successful until the appearance of yellow fever in Philadelphia, which
broke up his establishment and involved him in great difficulties;
for upon his school he depended entirely for his living. He had many
influential friends, who tempted him, at this crisis of his fortunes,
with magnificent promises of support, if only he would desert the cause
he had at heart--the propagandism of a religion based upon principles
of true temperance and active goodness. Both moral and physical
superiority pointed him out as one who could not fail to bring honour
to any undertaking, and, had he sacrificed conviction to interest, he
might have greatly advanced his material prospects. All such seductions
he firmly resisted.
Meanwhile, through the pulpit, the schoolroom, and, more widely,
through the newspapers, he scattered the seeds of the gospel
of Humanity. But the spirit of intolerance and persecution, of
self-seeking religionism, and of rancorous prejudice, was by no means
extinct even in the great republic, and the (so-called) “religious”
press united to denounce his humane teaching as well as his more
liberal theology. Nor did some of his more unscrupulous opponents
hesitate, in the last resort, to raise the war-cry of “infidel” and
“sceptic.” These assailants he treated with contemptuous silence; but
the principle of moral dietetics he defended in the newspapers with
ability and vigour. In 1821 he published an essay on _Abstinence from
the Flesh of Animals_, which was freely and extensively circulated. For
several years his missionary labours appear to have been unproductive.
In the year 1830 he made two notable converts--Dr. Sylvester Graham,
who was at that time engaged as a “temperance” lecturer, and was
deep in the study of human physiology; and Dr. W. Alcott. Five years
later, the _Moral Reformer_ was started as a monthly periodical,
which afterwards appeared under the title of the _Library of Health_.
In 1838-9 the _Graham Journal_ was also published in Boston, and
scientific societies were organised in many of the New England towns.
The Bible was largely appealed to in the controversy, and a sermon of
Metcalfe’s had an extensive circulation through the United States. With
all this controversy upon his hands, he was far from neglecting his
private duties, and, in fact, his health was over-taxed in the close
and constant work in the schoolrooms, overcrowded and ill-ventilated
as they were. In the day and night school he was constantly employed,
during one half of the year, from eight in the morning until ten at
night; and Sunday brought him no remission of labour.
In the propagandism of his principles through the press he was not
idle. The _Independent Democrat_, and, in 1838, the _Morning Star_,
was printed and published at his own office--by which latter journal,
in spite of the promise of support from political friends, he was a
pecuniary loser to a large amount. _The Temperance Advocate_, also
issued from his office, had no better success. Several years earlier,
about 1820, it is interesting to note, he had published a tract on _The
Duty of Abstinence from all Intoxicating Drinks_; and the founder of
the Bible Christian Church in America can claim the merit of having
been the first systematically to inculcate this social reform.
In the year 1847 the Vegetarian Society of Great Britain had been
founded, of which Mr. James Simpson had been elected the first
president. Metcalfe immediately proposed the formation of a like
society in the United States. He corresponded with Drs. Graham,
Alcott, and others; and finally an American Vegetarian Convention
assembled in New York, May 15, 1850. Several promoters of the cause,
previously unknown to each other (except through correspondence),
here met. Metcalfe was elected president of the Convention; addresses
were delivered, and the constitution of the society determined upon.
The Society was organised by the election of Dr. William Alcott as
president, Rev. W. Metcalfe as corresponding secretary, and Dr.
Trall as recording secretary. An organ of the society was started in
November, 1850, under the title of _The American Vegetarian and Health
Journal_, and under the editorship of Metcalfe. Its regular monthly
publication, however, did not begin until 1851. In that year he was
selected as delegate to the English Vegetarian Society, as well as
delegate from the Pennsylvania Peace Society to the “World’s Peace
Convention,” which was fondly supposed to be about to be inaugurated
by the _Universal Exhibition_ of that year. The proceedings at the
annual meeting of the Vegetarian Society of Great Britain, and the
eloquent address, amongst others, of the American representative, are
fully recorded in the _Vegetarian Messenger_ for 1852. On this occasion
Joseph Brotherton, M.P. presided.
Two years later he suffered the irreparable loss of the sympathising
sharer in his hopes for the regeneration of the world. Mrs. Metcalfe
died in the seventy-fourth year of her age, having been, during
forty-four years, a strict abstinent. Her loss was mourned by the
entire Vegetarian community. By far the larger part of the matter, as
well as the expenses of publication, of the _American Vegetarian_,
was supplied by the editor, and, being inadequately supported by the
rest of the community, the managers were forced to abandon its further
publication. The last volume appeared in 1854. It has been succeeded
in later times, under happier circumstances, by the _Health Reformer_
which is still in existence.
In 1855 Metcalfe received an invitation to undertake the duties
attached to the mother church at Salford. Leaving his brother-in-law
in charge of the church in Philadelphia, he embarked for England once
more, and the most memorable event, during his stay in this country,
was the deeply and sincerely lamented death of Joseph Brotherton, who
for twenty years had represented Salford in the Legislature, and whose
true benevolence had endeared him to the whole community. Metcalfe
was chosen to preach the funeral eulogy, which was listened to by a
large number of Members of Parliament and municipal officers, and by
an immense concourse of private citizens. Returning to America soon
afterwards, at the urgent request of his friends in Philadelphia,
he was, in 1859, elected to fill the place of President vacated by
Dr. Alcott, whose virtues and labours in the cause he commemorated
in a just eulogy. His own death took place in the year 1862, in the
seventy-fifth year of his age, caused by hemorrhage of the lungs,
doubtless the effect of excessive work. His end, like his whole
interior if not exterior life, was, in the best meaning of a too
conventional expression, full of peace and of hope. His best panegyric
is to be found in his life-work; and, as the first who systematically
taught the truths of reformed dietetics in the “New World,” he has
deserved the unceasing gratitude of all sincere reformers in the
United States, and, indeed, throughout the globe. By all who knew him
personally he was as much loved as he was esteemed, and the newspapers
of the day bore witness to the general lamentation for his loss.[264]
XLVII.
GRAHAM. 1794-1851.
As an exponent of the physiological basis of the Vegetarian theory of
diet, in the most elaborate minuteness, the author of _Lectures on
the Science of Human Life_ has always had great repute amongst food
reformers both in the United States and in this country. Collaterally
connected with the ducal house of Montrose, his father, a graduate of
Oxford, emigrated to Boston, U.S., in the year 1718. He must have
attained an advanced age when his seventeenth child, Sylvester,
was born at Suffield, in Connecticut. Yet he seems to have been of
a naturally dyspeptic and somewhat feeble constitution, which was
inherited by his son, whose life, in fact, was preserved only by the
method recommended by Locke--free exposure in the open air. During
several years he lived with an uncle, on whose farm he was made to work
with the labourers. In his twelfth year he was sent to a school in New
York, and at fourteen he was set for a short time to learn the trade of
paper-making. “He is described as handsome, clever, and imaginative.
‘I had heard,’ he says, ‘of noble deeds, and longed to follow in the
field of fame.’ Ill health soon obliged his return to the country, and
at sixteen symptoms of consumption appeared. Various occupations were
tried until the time, when about twenty years of age, he commenced as
a teacher of youth, proving highly successful with his pupils. Again
ill-health obliged the abandonment of this pursuit.”[265]
At the age of thirty-two he married, and soon after became a preacher
in the Presbyterian Church. Deeply interested in the question of
“Temperance,” he was invited to lecture for that cause by the
Pennsylvania Society (1830). He now began the study of physiology and
comparative anatomy, in which his interest was unremitting. These
important sciences were used to good effect in his future dietetic
crusade. At this time he came in contact with Metcalfe, by whom he
was confirmed in, if not in the first instance converted to, the
principles of radical dietary reform. “He was soon led to believe that
no permanent cure for intemperance could be found, except in such
change of personal and social customs as would relieve the human being
from all desire for stimulants. This idea he soon applied to medicine,
so that the prevention and cure of disease, as well as the remedy for
intemperance, were seen to consist mainly in the adoption of correct
habits of living, and the judicious adaptation of hygienic agencies.
These ideas were elaborated in an _Essay on the Cholera_ (1832), and
a course of lectures which were delivered in various parts of the
country, and subsequently published under the title of _Lectures on
the Science of Human Life_ (2 vols., Boston, 1839). This has been
the leading text-book of all the dietetic and nearly all the health
reformers since.”[266]
_The Science of Human Life_ is one of the most comprehensive as well as
minute text books on scientific dietetics ever put forth. If it errs
at all, it errs on the side of redundancy--a feature which it owes to
the fact that it was published to the world as it was orally given. It
therefore well bears condensation, and this has been judiciously done
by Mr. Baker, whose useful edition is probably in the hands of most of
our readers. Graham was also the author of a treatise on _Bread and
Bread-Making_, and “Graham bread” is now universally known as one of
the most wholesome kinds of the “staff of life.” Besides these more
practical writings, for some time before his death he occupied his
leisure in the production of a _Philosophy of Sacred History_, the
characteristic idea of which seems to have been to harmonise the dogmas
of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures with his published views on
physiology and dietetics. He lived to complete one volume only (12mo.),
which appeared after his death.
Tracing the history of Medicine from the earlier times, and its more or
less of empiricism in all its stages, Graham discovers the cause of a
vast proportion of all the egregious failure of its professors in the
blind prejudice which induces them to apply to the _temporary cure_,
rather than to the _prevention_, of disease. As it was in its first
barbarous beginning, so it has continued, with little really essential
change, to the present moment:--
“Everything is done with a view to _cure_ the disease, without
any regard to its cause, and the disease is considered as
the infliction of some supernatural being. Therefore, in the
progress of the healing art thus far, not a step is taken towards
investigating the laws of health and the philosophy of disease.
“Nor, after Medicine had received a more systematic form, did
it apply to those researches which were most essential to its
success, but, like religion, it became blended with superstitions
and absurdities. Hence, the history of Medicine, with very limited
exceptions, is a tissue of ignorance and error, and only serves
to demonstrate the absence of that knowledge upon which alone an
enlightened system of Medicine can be founded, and to show to
what extent a noble art can be perverted from its capabilities of
good to almost unmixed evil by the ignorance, superstition, and
cupidity of men. In modern times, anatomy and surgery have been
carried nearly to perfection, and great advance has been made
in physiology. The science of human life has been studied with
interest and success, but this has been confined to the few, while
even in our day, and in the medical profession itself, the general
tendency is adverse to the diffusion of scientific knowledge.
* * * * *
“The result is, that men prodigally waste the resources as if the
energies of life were inexhaustible; and when they have brought on
disease which destroys their comforts, they fly to the physician,
_not to learn by what violation of the laws of life_ they have
drawn the evil upon themselves, and by what means they can avoid
the same; but, considering themselves visited with afflictions
which they have in no manner been concerned in causing, they
require the physician’s remedies, by which their sufferings may be
alleviated. In doing this, the more the practice of the physician
conforms to the _appetites_ of the patient, the greater is his
popularity and the more generously is he rewarded.
“Everything, therefore, in society tends to confine the practising
physician to the department of therapeutics, and make him a
mere curer of disease; and the consequence is, that the medical
fraternity have little inducement to apply themselves to the
study of the _science of life_, while almost everything, by which
men can be corrupted, is presented to induce them to become the
mere panderers of human ignorance and folly; and, if they do not
sink into the merest empiricism, it is owing to their own moral
sensibility rather than to the encouragement they receive to pursue
an elevated scientific professional career.
“Thus the natural and acquired habits of man concur to divert
his attention from the study of human life, and hence he is left
to _feel_ his way to, or gather from what he calls experience,
all the conclusions which he embraces. It has been observed
that men, in their (so-called) inductive reasonings deceive
themselves continually, and think that they are reasoning from
facts and experience, when they are only reasoning _from a mixture
of truth and falsehood_. The only end answered by facts so
incorrectly apprehended is that of making error more incorrigible.
Nothing, indeed, is so hostile to the interests of Truth as
facts incorrectly observed. On no subjects are men so liable to
misapprehend facts, and _mistake the relation between cause and
effect_, as on that of human life, health, and disease.”
By the opponents of dietetic reform it has been pretended that climate,
or individual constitution, must determine the food proper for nations
or individuals:--
“We have been told that some enjoy health in warm, and others
in cold climates some on one kind of diet, and under one set of
circumstances, and some under another; that, therefore, what is
best for one is not for another; that what agrees _well_ with one
disagrees with another; that what is one man’s meat is another
man’s poison; that different constitutions require different
treatment; and that, consequently, no rules can be laid down
adapted to all circumstances which can be made a basis of regimen
to all.
“Without taking pains to examine circumstances, people consider the
bare fact that some intemperate individuals reach old age evidence
that such habits are not unfavourable to life. With the same loose
reasoning, people arrive at conclusions equally erroneous in regard
to nations. If a tribe, subsisting on vegetable food, is weak,
sluggish, and destitute of courage and enterprise, it is concluded
that vegetable food is the cause. Yet examination might have shown
that causes fully adequate to these effects existed, which not only
exonerated the diet, _but made it appear that the vegetable diet
had a redeeming effect, and was the means by which the nation was
saved from a worse condition_.
“The fact that individuals have attained a great age in certain
habits of living is no evidence that those habits are favourable to
longevity. The only use which we can make of cases of extraordinary
old age, is to show how the human constitution is capable of
sustaining the vital economy, _and resisting the causes which
induce death_.
“If we ask _how_ we must live to secure the best health and longest
life, the answer must be drawn from physiological knowledge; but
if we ask _how long_ the best mode of living will preserve life,
the reply is, Physiology cannot teach you that. Probably each
aged individual has a mixture of good and bad habits, and has
lived in a mixture of favourable and unfavourable circumstances.
Notwithstanding apparent diversity, there is a pretty equal amount
of what is salutary in the habits and circumstances of each. Some
have been ‘correct’ in one thing, some in another. All that is
proved by instances of longevity in connexion with bad habits is,
that such individuals are able to resist causes that have, in the
same time, sent thousands of their fellow-beings to an untimely
grave; and, under a proper regimen, they would have sustained life,
perhaps, a hundred and fifty years.
“Some have more constitutional [or inherited] powers to resist the
causes of disease than others, and, therefore, what will destroy
the life of one may be borne by another a long time without any
manifestations of immediate injury. There are, also, constitutional
peculiarities, but these are far more rare than is generally
supposed. Indeed, such may, in almost every case, be overcome by
a correct regimen. So far as the general laws of life and the
application of general principles of regimen are considered,
the human constitution is _one_: there are no constitutional
differences which will not yield to a correct regimen, and thus
improve the individual. Consequently, what is best for one is best
for all.... Some are born without any tendency to disease while
others have the predisposition to particular diseases of some kind.
But _differences result from causes which man has the power to
control_, and it is certain that all can be removed by conformity
to the laws of life for generations, and that the human species can
be brought to as great uniformity, as to health and life, as the
lower animals.”
With Hufeland, Flourens, and other scientific authorities, he maintains
that:--
“Physiological science affords no evidence that the human
constitution is not capable of gradually returning to the
primitive longevity of the species. The highest interests of our
nature require that _youthfulness_ should be prolonged. And it
is as capable of being preserved as life itself, both depending
on the same conditions. If there ever was a state of the human
constitution which enabled it to sustain life [much beyond the
present period], that state involved a harmony of relative
conditions. The vital processes were less rapid and more complete
than at present, development was slower, organisation more perfect,
childhood protracted, and the change from youth to manhood took
place at a greater remove from birth. Hence, if we now aim at long
life, we can secure our object only by conformity to those laws by
which youthfulness is prolonged.”
As for the _omnivorousness_ of the human animal:--
The ourang-outang, on being domesticated, readily learns to eat
animal food. But if this proves that animal to be _omnivorous_,
then the Horse, Cow, Sheep, and others are all omnivorous, for
everyone of them is easily trained to eat animal food. Horses
have frequently been trained to eat animal food,[267] and Sheep
have been so accustomed to it as to refuse grass. All carnivorous
animals can be trained to a vegetable diet, and brought to subsist
upon it, with less inconvenience and deterioration than herbivorous
or frugivorous animals can be brought to live on animal food.
Comparative anatomy, therefore, proves that Man is naturally a
frugivorous animal, formed to subsist upon fruits, seeds, and
farinaceous vegetables.[268]
The _stimulating_, or alcoholic, property of flesh produces the
delusion that it is, therefore, the most _nourishing_:--
“Yet by so much as the stimulation exceeds that which is necessary
for the performance of the functions of the organs, the more does
the expenditure of vital powers exceed the renovating economy; and
the exhaustion which succeeds is commensurate with the excess.
Hence, though food which contains the greatest proportion of
stimulating power causes a _feeling_ of the greatest strength, it
also produces the greatest exhaustion, which is commensurately
importunate for relief; and, as the same food affords such by
supplying the requisite stimulation, their _feelings_ lead the
consumers to believe that it is most strengthening.... Those
substances, the stimulating power of which is barely sufficient to
excite the digestive organs in the appropriation of nourishment,
are most conducive to vital welfare, causing all the processes to
be most perfectly performed, without any unnecessary expenditure,
thus contributing to health and longevity.
“Flesh-meats average about _thirty-five per cent_ of nutritious
matter, while rice, wheat, and several kinds of pulse (such as
lentils, peas, and beans), afford from _eighty to ninety-five per
cent_; potatoes afford twenty-five per cent of nutritious matter.
So that one pound of rice contains more nutritious matter than two
pounds and a half of flesh meat; three pounds of whole meal bread
contain more than six pounds of flesh, and three pounds of potatoes
more than two pounds of flesh.”
That the human species, _taken in its entirety_, is no more carnivorous
_de facto_ than it could be _de jure_, is apparent on the plain
evidence of facts. In all countries of our Globe, with the exception of
the most barbarous tribes, it is, in reality, only the ruling and rich
classes who are kreophagist. The Poor have, almost everywhere, but the
barest sufficiency even of vegetable foods:--