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Political economists tell us that the produce of an acre of land in wheat, corn, potatoes, and other vegetables, and in fruits, will sustain animal life sixteen times as long as when the produce of the same acre is converted into flesh, by feeding and fattening animals upon it.

— William Alcott Vegetable Diet (1838)

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More quotes by William Alcott

The destruction of animals for food, in its details and tendencies, involves so much of cruelty as to cause every reflecting individual — not destitute of the ordinary sensibilities of our nature — to shudder.

Vegetable Diet (1838)

No child, I think, can walk through a common market or slaughter-house without receiving moral injury; nor am I quite sure that any virtuous adult can.

Vegetable Diet (1838)

None, so far as I know, will affirm, or at least with any show of reason maintain, that anatomy, so far as that goes, is in favor of flesh-eating.

Vegetable Diet (1838)

The world, I mean our own portion of it, sometimes seems to me like one mighty slaughter-house — one grand school for the suppression of every kind and tender and brotherly feeling — one grand process of education to the entire destitution of all moral principle — one vast scene of destruction to all moral sensibility, and all sympathy with the woes of those around us. Is it not so?

Vegetable Diet (1838)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: William Alcott (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.