Vegetable Diet: As Sanctioned by Medical Men, and by Experience in All Ages: Including a System of Vegetable Cookery

they stood to their common Father. And yet, after all, his doctrines appear to have been mingled with much bigotry and superstition. THE ESSENES. The following account of this singular sect of the ancient Jews is abridged from an article in the Annals of Education, for July, 1836. The number of this vegetable-eating sect is not known, though, according to Philo, there were four thousand of them in the single province of Judea. "Pliny, says that the Essenes of Judea fed on the fruit of the palm-tree. But, however this may have been, it is agreed, on all hands, that, like the ancient Pythagoreans, they lived exclusively on vegetable food, and that they were abstinent in regard to the quantity even of this. They would not kill a living creature, even for sacrifices. It is also understood that they treated diseases of every kind--though it does not appear that they were subject to many--with roots and herbs. Josephus says they were long-lived, and that many of them lived over a hundred years. This he attributes to their 'regular course of life,' and especially to 'the simplicity of their diet.'" THE BRAMINS. The Bramins, or Brahmins, are, as is probably well known, the first of the four _castes_ among the Hindoos. They are the priests of the people, and are remarkable, in their way, for their sanctity. Of their number I am not at present apprised, but it must be very great. But, however great it may be, they are vegetable eaters of the strictest sect. They are not even allowed to eat eggs; and I believe milk and its products are also forbidden them; but of this I am not quite certain. Besides adhering to the strictest rules of temperance, they are also required to observe frequent fasts of the most severe kind, and to practice regular and daily, and sometimes thrice daily ablutions. They subsist much on green herbs, roots, and fruits; and at some periods of their ministry, they live much in the open air. And yet those of them who are true Bramins--who live up to the