"But for the sake of some little mouthful of flesh,
we deprive a soul of the sun and light, and of the proportion of life
and time it had been born into the world to enjoy."
-The Moralia
"Can you really ask what reason Pythagoras had for abstaining from
flesh?
I, for my part, marvel at what sort of feeling, mind, or reason that man
was possessed who was the first to pollute his mouth with gore, and to
allow his lips to touch the flesh of the murdered beings; who spread his
table with the mangled forms of dead bodies, and claimed as his daily
food what were but now beings endowed with movement, with perception,
and with voice.
How could his eyes endure the spectacle of the flayed and dismembered
limbs? How was his taste not sickened by contact with festering wounds,
with the pollution of corrupted blood and juices?
Man makes use of flesh not out of want and necessity, seeing that he
has the liberty to make his choice of herbs and fruits the plenty of
which is inexhaustible; but out of luxury, and being cloyed with
necessaries, he seeks after impure and inconvenient diet, purchased by
the slaughter of living beings; by showing himself more cruel than the
most savage of wild beasts."
(Essay on Flesh Eating)
"Can you really ask what reason Pythagoras had for abstaining from
flesh? For my part I rather wonder both by what accident and in what
state of soul or mind the first man did so, touched his mouth to gore
and brought his lips to the flesh of a dead creature, he who set forth
tables of dead, stale bodies and ventured to call food and nourishment
the parts that had a little before bellowed and cried, moved and lived.
How could his eyes endure the slaughter when throats were slit and hides
flayed and limbs torn from limb? How could his nose endure the stench?
How was it that the pollution did not turn away his taste, which made
contact with the sores of others and sucked juices and serums from
mortal wounds?
"Can you really ask for what reason Pythagoras had for abstaining
from flesh? For my part I rather wonder both by what accident and in
what state of soul or mind the first man did so, touched his mouth to
gore and brought his lips the flesh of a dead body."
"The obligations of law and equity reach only to mankind; but
kindness and beneficence should be extended to the creatures of every
species, and these will flow from the breast of a true man, as streams
that issue from the living fountain."
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