Italy, Switzerland, France, Spain, England, Scotland, Ireland, a
considerable portion of Prussia, and other parts of Europe subsist
mainly on non-flesh foods. The peasantry of modern Greece [like
those of the days of Perikles] subsist on coarse brown bread and
fruits. The peasantry in many parts of Russia live on very coarse
bread, with garlic and other vegetables, and, like the same class
in Greece, Italy, &c., they are obliged to be extremely frugal even
in this kind of food. Yet they are [for the most part] healthy,
vigorous, and active. Many of the inhabitants of Germany live
mainly on rye and barley, in the form of coarse bread. The potato
is the principal food of the Irish peasantry, and few portions
of the human family are more healthy, athletic, and active, when
uncorrupted by intoxicating substances [and, it may be added, when
under favourable political and social conditions]. But alcohol,
opium, &c. [equally with bad laws] have extended their blighting
influence over the greater portion of the world, and nowhere do
these scourges so cruelly afflict the self-devoted race as in the
cottages of the poor, and when, by these evils and neglect of
sanitation, &c., diseases are generated, sometimes epidemics, we
are told that these things arise from their poor, meagre, low,
_vegetable_ diet. Wherever the various sorts of intoxicating
substances are absent, and a decent degree of cleanliness is
observed, the vegetable diet is not thus calumniated.
“That portion of the peasantry of England and Scotland who subsist
on their barley and oatmeal bread, porridge, potatoes, and other
vegetables, with temperate, cleanly habits [and surroundings],
are able to endure more fatigue and exposure than any other class
of people in the same countries. _Three-fourths of the whole
human family_, in all periods of time [excepting, perhaps, in the
primitive wholly predatory ages] have subsisted on non-flesh foods,
and when their supplies have been abundant, and their habits in
other respects correct, they have been well nourished.”
That the sanguinary diet and savagery go hand in hand, and that in
proportion to the degree of carnivorousness is the barbarous or
militant character of the people, all History, past and present, too
clearly testifies. Nor are the carnivorous tribes conspicuous by their
cruel habits only:--
“Taking all flesh-eating nations together, though some, whose
other habits are favourable, are, comparatively, well-formed, as
a general average they are small, ill-formed races; and taking
all vegetable-eating nations, though many, from excessive use
of narcotics, and from other unfavourable circumstances, are
comparatively small and ill-formed, as a general average they are
much better formed races than the flesh-eaters.[269] It is only
among those tribes whose habits are temperate, and who subsist on
the non-flesh diet, that the more perfect specimens of symmetry are
found.
“Not one human being in many thousands dies a _natural_ death.
If a man be shot or poisoned we say he dies a violent death, but
if he is ill, attended by physicians, and dies, we say he dies a
‘natural’ death. This is an abuse of language--the death in the
latter case being as truly violent as if he had been shot. Whether
a man takes arsenic and kills himself, or by small doses or other
means, however common, gradually destroys life, he equally dies a
violent death. He only dies a natural death who so obeys the laws
of his nature as by neither irritation nor intensity to waste his
energies, but slowly passes through the changes of his system to
old age, and falls asleep in the exhaustion of vitality.”[269]
With Flourens he adduces a number of instances both of individuals and
of communities who have attained to protracted ages by reason of a pure
diet. He afterwards proceeds to prove from comparative physiology and
anatomy, and, in particular, from the conformation of the human teeth
and stomach (which, by an astounding perversion of fact, are sometimes
alleged to be formed carnivorously, in spite of often-repeated
scientific authority, as well as of common observation), the natural
frugivorous character of the human species, and he quotes Linné,
Cuvier, Lawrence, Bell, and many others in support of this truth.[270]
XLVIII.
STRUVE. 1805-1870.
Germany, at the present day able to boast so many earnest apostles of
humanitarianism, until the nineteenth century was some way advanced,
had contributed little, definitely, to the literature of _Humane
Dietetics_. A Haller or a Hufeland, indeed, had, with more or less
boldness, raised the banner of partial revolt from orthodox medicine
and orthodox living, but their heterodoxy was rather hygienic than
humane. In the history of humanitarianism in Germany the honour of the
first place, in order of time, belongs to the author of _Pflanzenkost,
die Grundlage einer Neuen Weltanschauung_, and of _Mandaras’
Wanderungen_, whose life, political as well as literary, was one
continuous combat on behalf of justice, freedom, and true progress.
Gustav von Struve was born at München (Munich), October 11, 1805, from
whence his father, who was residing there as Russian Minister, shortly
afterwards removed to Stuttgart. The foundation of his education was
laid in the gymnasium of that capital, where he remained until his
twelfth year. From 1817 to 1822 he was a scholar in the Lyceum in
Karlsruhe. Having finished his preparatory studies in those schools,
he proceeded to the University of Göttingen, which, after a course of
nearly two years, he exchanged for Heidelberg. Four years of arduous
study enabled him to pass his first examination, and, as the result of
his brilliant attainments and success, he received the appointment of
_Attaché_ to the Bundestag Embassy at Oldenberg.
With such an opening, a splendid career in the service of courts and
kings seemed to be reserved for him. His family connexions, his great
abilities, and his unusual acquirements at so early an age guaranteed
to him quick promotion, with reward and worldly honour. But to figure
in the service of the oppressors of the people--to waste in luxurious
trifling the resources of a peasantry, supplied by them only at the
cost of a life-time of painful destitution, to support the selfish
greed and vain ostentation of the Jew--such was not the career which
could stimulate the ambition of Struve. The conviction that this was
not his proper destiny grew stronger in him, and he soon abandoned his
diplomatic position and Oldenberg at the same time. Without wealth
or friends, at variance with his relatives, who could not appreciate
his higher aims, he settled himself in Göttingen (1831), and in the
following year in Jena. His attempts to obtain fixed employment
as professor or teacher, or as editor of a newspaper, long proved
unsuccessful, for independent and honest thought, never anywhere
greatly in esteem, at that time in Germany was in especial disfavour
with all who, directly or indirectly, were under court influences. Yet
the three years which he lived in Göttingen and Jena supplied him with
varied and useful experiences.
In 1833 he went to Karlsruhe. After years of long patience and effort,
he at length effected his object (to gain a position which should
make it possible for him to carry out his schemes of usefulness for
his fellow-beings), and, at the end of 1836, he obtained the office
of Obergerichts-Advocat in Mannheim. This position gave leisure
and opportunity for the prosecution of his various scientific and
philosophic pursuits, and to engage in literary undertakings. He
founded periodicals and delivered lectures, the constant aim of which
was the improvement of the world around him. At this period he wrote
his philosophic romance, _Mandaras’ Wanderungen_ (“The Wanderings of
Mandaras”), through which he conveys distasteful truths in accordance
with the principles of Tasso.[271]
Struve’s active political life began in 1845. In that year were
published _Briefwechsel zwischen einen ehemaligen and einen jetzigen
Diplomaten_,(“Correspondence between an Old and a Modern Diplomatist”),
which was soon followed by his _Oeffentliches Recht des Deutschen
Bundes_ (“Public Rights of the German Federation”) and his _Kritische
Geschichte des Allgemeinen Staats-Rechts_ (“Critical History of the
Common Law of Nations”). In the same year he undertook the editorship
of the _Mannheimer Journal_, in which he boldly fought the battles
of political and social reform. He was several times condemned to
imprisonment, as well as to payment of fines; but, undeterred by such
persecution, the champion of the oppressed succeeded in worsting most
of his powerful enemies.
In the beginning of 1847 he founded a weekly periodical, the _Deutscher
Zuschauer_ (“The German Spectator”), in which, without actually
adopting the invidious names, he maintained in their fullest extent
the principles of Freedom and Fraternity; and it was chiefly by the
efforts of Struve that the great popular demonstration at Oldenberg of
September 12, 1847, took place, which formulated what was afterwards
known as the “Demands of the People.” The public meeting, assembled
at the same town March 9, 1848, which was attended by 25,000 persons,
and which, without committing itself to the adoption of the term
“republican,” yet proclaimed the inherent Rights of the People, was
also mainly the work of the indefatigable Struve. He took part, too, in
the opening of the Parliament at Frankfurt. His principal production
at this time was _Grundzüge der Staats-Wischenschaft_ (“Outlines of
Political Science”). This book, inspired by the movement for freedom
which was then agitating, but, as it proved, for the most part
ineffectually, a large part of Europe, is not without significance
in the education of the community for higher political conceptions.
Struve and F. Hecker took a leading part in the democratic movements
in Baden. These attempts failing, after a short residence in Paris,
he settled near Basel (Basle). There he published his _Grundrechte
des Deutschen Volkes_ (“Fundamental Rights of the German People”),
and, in association with Heinzen, a _Plan für Revolutionierung und
Republikanisierung Deutschlands_. The earnest and noble convictions
apparent in all the writings of the author, and the unmistakable purity
of his aims, forced from the more candid of the opponents of his
political creed recognition and high respect. Nevertheless, he narrowly
escaped legal assassination and the _fusillades_ of the Kriegsgericht
or Military Tribunal.
Later the unsuccessful lover of his country sought refuge in England,
and from thence proceeded to the United States (1850). Upon the
breaking out of the desperate struggle between the North and South, he
threw in his lot with the former, and took part in several battles. In
America he wrote his historical work _Weltgeschichte_ (12 vols.) and,
amongst others, _Abeilard und Heloise_. In 1861 he returned to Europe,
and, at different periods, wrote two of his most important books,
_Pflanzenkost, die Grundlage einer Neuen Weltanschauung_ (“Vegetable
Diet, the Foundation of a New World-View”), and _Das Seelenleben,
oder die Naturgeschichte des Menschen_ (“The Spiritual Life, or the
Natural History of Man”), in both of which he earnestly insists, not
only upon the vast and incalculable suffering inflicted, in the most
barbarous manner, upon the victims of the _Table_, but, further, upon
the demoralising influence of living by pain and slaughter:--
“The thoughts and feelings which the food we partake of provokes
are not remarked in common life, but they, nevertheless, have their
significance. A man who daily sees Cows and Calves slaughtered,
or who kills them himself, Hogs ‘stuck,’ Hens plucked, or Geese
roasted alive, &c., cannot possibly retain any true feeling for
the sufferings of his own species. He becomes hardened to them by
witnessing the struggles of other animals as they are being driven
by the butcher, the groans of the dying Ox, or the screams of the
bleeding Hog, with indifference.... Nay, he may come even to find
a devilish pleasure in seeing beings tortured and killed, or in
actually slaughtering them himself....
“But even those who take no part in killing, nay, do not even see
it, are conscious that the flesh-dishes upon their tables come from
the Shambles, and that _their feasting and the suffering of others
are in intimate connexion_. Doubtless, the majority of flesh-eaters
do not reflect upon the manner in which this food comes to them,
but this thoughtlessness, far from being a virtue, is the parent of
many vices.... How very different are the thoughts and sentiments
produced by the non-flesh diet!”[272]
The last period of his life was passed in Wien (Vienna), and in that
city his beneficently-active career closed in August, 1870. His last
broken words to his wife, some hours before his end, were, “I must
leave the world ... this war ... this conflict!” With the life of
Gustav Struve was extinguished that of one of the noblest soldiers of
the Cross of Humanity. His memory will always be held in high honour
wherever justice, philanthropy, and humane feeling are in esteem.
In _Mandaras’ Wanderungen_, of a different inspiration from that of
ordinary fiction, and which is full of refinement of thought and
feeling, are vividly represented the repugnance of a cultivated Hindu
when brought, for the first time, into contact with the barbarisms of
European civilisation. To few of our English readers, it is presumable,
is this charming story known; and an outline of its principal incidents
will not be supererogatory here.
The hero, a young Hindu, whose home is in one of the secluded
valleys of the Himalaya, urged by the solicitude of the father of
his betrothed, who wishes to prove him by contact with so different
a world, sets out on a course of travel in Europe. The story opens
with the arrival of his ship at Leftheim (Livorno) on the Italian
coast. Mandaras has no sooner landed than he is accosted by two
clerics (_ordensgeistliche_), who wish to acquire the honour and
glory of making a convert. But, unhappily for their success, like his
predecessor Amabed, he had already on his voyage discovered that the
religion of the people, among whom he was destined to reside, did not
exclude certain horrible barbarisms hitherto unknown to him in his own
unchristian land:--
“While still on board ship I had been startled when I saw the rest
of the passengers feeding on the flesh of animals. ‘By what right,’
I asked them, ‘do you kill other animals to feed upon their flesh?’
They could not answer, but they continued to eat their salted
flesh as much as ever. For my part, I would have rather died than
have eaten a piece of it. But now it is far worse. I can pass
through no street in which there are not poor slaughtered animals,
hung up either entire or cut into pieces. Every moment I hear the
cries of agony and of alarm of the victims whom they are driving
to the slaughter-house,--see their struggles against the murderous
knife of the butcher. Ever and again I ask of one or other of the
men who surround me, _by what right_ they kill them and devour
their flesh; but if I receive an answer, it is returned in phrases
which mean nothing or in repulsive laughter.”
In fact the Hindu traveller had been but a brief space of time in
Christian lands when he finds himself, almost unconsciously, in the
position of a _catechist_ rather than of a _catechumen_. One day,
for example, he finds himself in the midst of a vast crowd, of all
classes, hurrying to some spectacle. Inquiring the cause of so vast an
assemblage, he learns that some persons are to be put to death with
all the frightful circumstances of public executions. After travelling
through a great part of Germany, he fixes his residence, for the
purpose of study, in the University of Lindenberg. In the society of
that place he meets with a young girl, Leonora, the daughter of a
Secretary of Legation, who engages his admiration by her exceptional
culture and refinement of mind. On the occasion of an excursion of
a party of her father’s visitors, of some days, to an island on the
neighbouring coast, the first discussion on humane dietetics takes
place, when, being asked the reason of his _eccentricity_, he appeals
to the ladies of the party, believing that he shall have at least
_their_ sympathy with the principles he lays down:--
“From you, ladies, doubtless I shall meet with approval. Tell
me, could you, _with your own hands_, kill to-day a gentle Lamb,
a soft Dove, with whom perhaps you yesterday were playing? You
answer--No? You dare not say you could. If you were to say yes,
you would, indeed, betray a hard heart. But why could you not? Why
did it cause you anguish, when you saw a defenceless animal driven
to slaughter? Because you felt, _in your inmost soul_, that it is
wrong, that it is unjust to kill a defenceless and innocent being!
With quite other feelings would you look on the death of a Tiger
that attacks men, than on that of a Lamb who has done harm to no
one. To the one action attaches, naturally, justice; to the other,
injustice. Follow the inner promptings of your heart,--no longer
sanction the slaughter of innocent beings by feeding on their
bodies (_beförden Sie nicht deren Tödtung dadurch dass Sie ihr
Fleisch essen_).”
This exhortation, to his surprise, was received by all “the softer sex”
with coldness, and even with signs of impatience, excepting Leonora,
who acknowledged the force of his appeal and promised to the best
of her power to follow his example. Pleased and encouraged by her
approval, he proceeds:--
“Assuredly it will not repent you to have formed this resolution.
The man who, with firmly-grounded habits, denies himself something
which lies in his power, to spare pain and death to living and
sentient beings, must become milder and more loving. The man who
steels himself against the feeling of compassion for the lower
animals, will be more or less hard towards his own species; while
he who shrinks from giving pain to other beings, will so much the
more shrink from inflicting it upon his fellow men.”
Leonora, however, was a rare exception in his experience; and the more
he saw of Christian customs, the less did he feel disposed to change
his religion, which, by the way, was of an unexceptionable kind. Some
time before his leaving Lindenberg, the secretary’s wife gave a dinner
in his honour, which, in compliment to her guest, was without any
flesh-dish. As a matter of course, the conversation soon turned upon
Dietetics; and one of the guests, a cleric, challenged the Hindu to
defend his principles. Mandaras had scarcely laid down the cardinal
article of his creed as a fundamental principle in Ethics--that it is
unjust to inflict suffering upon a living and sensitive being, which
(as he insists) cannot be called in question _without shaking the very
foundations of Morality_ (_welcher nicht die Sittenlehre in ihren
Fundamenten erschüttern will_)--when opponents arise on all sides of
him. A doctor of medicine led the opposition, confidently affirming
that the human frame itself proved men to be intended for flesh-eating.
Mandaras replied that:--
“It seemed to him, on the contrary, that it is the bodily frame of
man that especially declares _against_ flesh-eating. The Tiger,
the Lion, in short, all flesh-eating animals seized their prey,
running, swimming, or flying, and tore it in pieces with their
teeth or talons, devouring it there and then upon the spot. Man
cannot catch other animals in this way, or tear them in pieces, and
devour them as they are.... Besides he has higher, and not merely
animal, impulses. The latter lead him to gluttony, intemperance,
and many other vices. Providence has given him reason to prove what
is right and what wrong, and power of will to avoid what he has
discovered to be wrong. The doctor, however, in place of admitting
this argument, grew all the warmer. ‘In all Nature,’ said he, ‘one
sees how the lower existence is serviceable to the higher. As man
does, so do other animals seize upon the weaker, and the weakest
upon plants, &c.’”
To this the Hindu philosopher in vain replies, _that_ the sphere of
man, is _wider_, and ought therefore to be _higher_ than that of other
animals, for the larger the circle in which a being can freely move,
the greater is the possible degree of his perfection; _that_, if we
are to place ourselves on the plane of the carnivora in one point,
why not in all, and recognise also treachery, fierceness, and murder
in general, as proper to man _that_ the different character of the
Tiger, the Hyæna, the Wolf on the one side, and of the Elephant, the
Camel, the Horse on the other, instruct us as to the mighty influence
of food upon the disposition, and certainly not to the advantage of
the flesh-eaters; _that_ man is to strive not after the lower but the
higher character, &c., &c. To this the hostess replies: “This may
be all very beautiful and good, but how is the housekeeper to be so
skilful as to provide for all her guests, if she is to withhold from
them flesh dishes?” “Exactly as our housekeepers do in the Himalayan
valley--exactly as our hostess does to-day,” rejoins Mandaras. He
alleges many other arguments, and in particular the high degree
of reasoning faculty, and even of moral feeling, exhibited by the
miserable slaves of human tyranny. Various are the objections raised,
which, it is needless to say, are successfully overthrown by the
champion of Innocence, and the company disperse after a prolonged
discussion.
The second division of the story takes us to the Valley of Suty, the
Himalayan home of Mandaras, and introduces us to his amiable family.
A young German, travelling in that region, chances to meet with the
father of Urwasi (Mandaras’s betrothed), whom he finds bowed down
with grief for the double loss of his daughter, who had pined away in
the protracted absence of her lover and succumbed to the sickness of
hope deferred, and of his destined son-in-law, who, upon his return
to claim his mistress, had fallen (as it appeared) into a death-swoon
at the shock of the terrible news awaiting him. The old man conducts
the stranger to the scene of mourning, where Damajanti, the sister
of Mandaras, with her friend Sunanda, is engaged in weaving garlands
of flowers to deck the bier of her beloved brother. An interesting
conversation follows between the European stranger and the Hindu
ladies, who are worthy representatives of their countrywoman,
Sakuntalà.[273] Accidentally they discover that he is a flesh-eater.
_Sunanda_: Is it possible that you really belong to those men who
think it lawful to kill other beings to feed upon their bleeding
limbs?
_Theobald_: In my country it is the ordinary custom. Do you not, in
your country, use such food?
_Damajanti_: Can you ask? Have not other animals feeling? Do they
not enjoy their existence?
_Theobald_: Certainly; but they are so much below us, that there
can be no _reciprocity_ of duties between us.
_Damajanti_: The higher we stand in relation to other animals,
the more are we bound to disregard none of the eternal laws of
Morality, and, in particular, that of Love. Hateful is it, at all
events, to inflict pain upon an innocent being capable of feeling
pain. Or do you consider it permissible to strike a dog, to witness
the trembling of his limbs, and to hear his cries?
_Theobald_: By no means. I hold, also, that it is wrong to torture
them, because we ought to feel no pleasure in the sufferings of
other animals.
_Damajanti_: We ought to feel no _pleasure_! That is very cold
reasoning. Detestation--disgust, rather, is the sensation we ought
to have. Where this sentiment is real, there can be no desire
to profit by the sufferings of others. Yet, where the feelings
of disgust for what is bad are weaker than inclination to the
self-indulgence which it promises, there is no possibility of their
triumphing. For _gain_ the butcher slaughters the victim; for
_horrible luxury_ other men participate in this murder, while they
devour the pieces of flesh, in which, a few moments before, the
blood was still flowing, the nerves yet quivering, the life still
breathing!
_Theobald_: I admit it: but all this is new to me. From childhood
upwards I have been accustomed to see animals driven to the
slaughter-house. It gave me no pleasure rather it was a positively
displeasing spectacle; but I did not think about it--whether we
have the right to slaughter for food, because I had never heard
doubt expressed on the matter.
_Sunanda_: Ah! Now I can well believe that the men in your country
_must_ be hard and cold. Every softer feeling _must_ be hardened,
every tenderer one be dulled in the daily scenes of murder which
they have before their eyes, by the blood which they shed daily,
which they taste daily. Happy am I that I live far from your world.
A thousand times would I rather endure death than live in so
horrible a land.