Temper and Diet (1843)

AUTHOR: Lane, Charles

PUBLICATION: “Temper and Diet.” The New Age, Concordium Gazette and Temperance Advocate. Vol. 1, no. 7 (1 July 1843): 54-59.
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.32044092691138&seq=70

In this article, Charles Lane explicitly calls for an end to the eating of animal flesh. His tone is polemical; for example: “The lustful rationalist can spin reasons for his conduct as readily as the spider spins webs, and out of the same storehouse too – his bowels” (55).

KEYWORDS: food, veg*nism, animals, health

SUMMARY (Ridvan Askin, edited Deborah Madsen):

This short, polemical article targets the connection between choice of diet and intellectual capacity. The first sentence reads: "WHENEVER any arguments are brought forth, tending to show how serious an injury is inflicted on the intellectual powers in man, by his indulgence in all manner of gross diet, appeal is pretty sure to be made to the many instances of highly intellectual men who have been anything but choice or cleanly in their eating and drinking" (54). Lane is quick to debunk this fallacious argument: “No great mind ever performed its greatest works under a surfeit of eating. No great mind ever was aided to its noblest exercise by indiscriminate use of food. No great mind ever did realize its highest conception except under the condition of care in respect to diet” (55). Restrictions in diet, Lane suggests, might actually help to reduce “ignorant admiration of great men” in favor of “more admirable greatness” (55). For Lane, it is clear that “[i]f men foster and feed their lower capacities and natures in preference to their superior ones, they will of course grow and strengthen, while the latter will be diminished and weakened” (55). Accordingly, “[t]he man who carries his idea of pleasure no higher than a slice of beef and a newspaper; is wont to ridicule the assertion that the beauty in bread and a mathematical problem is far more excellent. Still less can he comprehend the happiness in an entirely simple life, unworried by commercial cares, and in all things elevated to poetic excellence” (55-56).

Lane blames for this state of affairs the way everyday life and economy are organized, “as every true aim in life is set aside upon this unwise pretext, originated in lust, and maintained by slavery and passion” (56). The influence of diet on our temper is undeniable, Lane states, and everyone agrees on this point with respect to drink – the purer the better. Not so with solid foods. But, Lane insists, “it is only by the commonness of its use that the impurity of animal and other exciting solids is doubted” (57). He also denies carnists a voice in these matters, just as we also do not listen to alcoholics when it comes to alcoholism: “It seems as absurd to permit a flesh-eater to pronounce on the propriety of a bloody diet, as to allow the toper to determine the goodness of his drams” (57). Expanding the analogy, Lane maintains that meat-eating has the same detrimental effects on both intellect and sentiment as alcohol.

The Gazette appends a short editorial note attributing authorship to Charles Lane and stating that the original was reportedly published in the “Independent Magazine” (58). The note is followed by a longer quotation from the Vermont Telegraph, which commends the article for addressing the “stupidity” that reigns “on the subject of eating” and for “tracing the connection between the eating and the stupidity” (58).

 

Last updated on February 9th, 2024

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