You have just dined, and however scrupulously the slaughterhouse is concealed in the graceful distance of miles, there is complicity.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
I do feel that spiritual progress does demand, at some stage, that we should cease to kill our fellow creatures for the satisfaction of our bodily wants.
—Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869–1948) Indian Hindu Political leader
It is only by softening and disguising dead flesh by culinary preparation that it is rendered susceptible of mastication or digestion, and that the sight of its bloody juices and raw horror does not excite intolerable loathing and disgust.
—Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822) English Poet, Dramatist, Essayist, Novelist
I eat everything that nature voluntarily gives: fruits, vegetables, and the products of plants. But I ask you to spare me what animals are forced to surrender: meat, milk, and cheese.
—Anonymous
I, for my part, wonder what sort of feeling, mind or reason that man was possessed who was first to pollute his mouth with gore, and allow his lips to touch the flesh of a murdered being; who spread his table with the mangled form of dead bodies, and claimed as daily food and dainty dishes what but know were beings endowed with with movement, with perception and with voice.
—Plutarch (c.46–c.120 CE) Greek Biographer, Philosopher
Most vegetarians I ever see looked enough like their food to be classed as cannibals.
—Finley Peter Dunne (1867–1936) American Author, Writer, Humorist
Fork: An instrument used chiefly for the purpose of putting dead animals into the mouth.
—Ambrose Bierce (1842–1913) American Short-story Writer, Journalist
It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favor of vegetarianism, while the wolf remains of a different opinion.
—William Motter Inge (1913–73) American Playwright, Novelist
I am not a complete vegetarian. I eat only animals that have died in their sleep
—George Carlin (1937–2008) American Stand-up Comedian
When a man of normal habits is ill, everyone hastens to assure him that he is going to recover. When a vegetarian is ill which fortunately very seldom happens, everyone assures him that he is going to die, and that they told him so, and that it serves him right. They implore him to take at least a little gravy, so as to give himself a chance of lasting out the night
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
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?
—Plutarch (c.46–c.120 CE) Greek Biographer, Philosopher
Think of the fierce energy concentrated in an acorn! You bury it in the ground, and it explodes into an oak! Bury a sheep, and nothing happens but decay.
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
Thou shall not kill does not apply to murder of one’s own kind only, but to all living beings; and this Commandment was inscribed in the human breast long before it was proclaimed from Sinai
—Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) Russian Novelist
To my mind, the life of a lamb is no less precious than that of a human being. I should be unwilling to take the life of a lamb for the sake of the human body.
—Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869–1948) Indian Hindu Political leader
A man can live and be healthy without killing animals for food; therefore, if he eats meat, he participates in taking animal life merely for the sake of his appetite. And to act so is immoral
—Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) Russian Novelist
I am not a vegetarian because I love animals; I am a vegetarian because I hate plants.
—A. Whitney Brown (b.1952) American Comedian, TV Personality
Truely man is the king of beasts, for his brutality exceeds theirs. We live by the death of others: we are burial places! I have from an early age abjured the use of meat, and the time will come when men such as I will look on the murder of animals as they now look on the murder of men.
—Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Polymath, Painter, Sculptor, Inventor, Architect
Be kind to all that lives.
—Fo-sho-hing-tsan-king
I never go without my dinner. No one ever does, except vegetarians and people like that.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be a vegetarian.
—Paul McCartney (b.1942) English Pop Singer, Songwriter
Then God said, I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.
—The Holy Bible Scripture in the Christian Faith
For the most part, we carnivores do not eat other carnivores. We prefer to eat our vegetarian friends.
—Robert Brault
Thousands of people who say they ‘love’ animals sit down once or twice a day to enjoy the flesh of creatures who have been treated so with little respect and kindness just to make more meat.
—Jane Goodall (b.1934) British Primatologist, Conservationist
Animals are my friends… and I do not eat my friends.
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
I have no doubt that it is a part of the destiny of the human race, in its gradual improvement, to leave off eating animals, as surely as the savage tribes have left off eating each other when they came in contact with the more civilized.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–62) American Philosopher
If we’re not supposed to eat animals … how come they’re made out of meat?
—Anonymous
Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born Physicist
Never would it occur to a child that a sheep, a pig, a cow or a chicken was good to eat, while, like Milton’s Adam, he would eagerly make a meal off fruits, nuts, thyme, mint, peas and broad beans which penetrate further and stimulate not only the appetite but other vague and deep nostalgias. We are closer to the Vegetable Kingdom than we know; is it not for man alone that mint, thyme, sage, and rosemary exhale “crush me and eat me!”—for us that opium poppy, coffee-berry, tea-plant and vine perfect themselves? Their aim is to be absorbed by us, even if it can only be achieved by attaching themselves to roast mutton.
—Cyril Connolly (1903–74) British Literary Critic, Writer
While we ourselves are the living graves of murdered beasts, how can we expect any ideal conditions on this earth?
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
Man is the only animal that can remain on friendly terms with the victims he intends to eat until he eats them.
—Samuel Butler
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