Of course, vegetarianism is no new thing. Its principal exponent was Sylvester Graham. It so happens that he was the brother of my great grandmother, and of him my father wrote in 1861, "long lanky Sylvester Vegetable Graham, leanest of men." Graham in 1829 began the advocacy of moderation in the use of a diet consisting of vegetables, Graham bread, fruits, nuts, salts and pure water, and excluding meat, sauces, salads, tea, coffee, alcohol, pepper, and mustard. The first effect of this diet, which largely eliminated the flavors, was to reduce the weight through lowering the intake of food, but the health of many followers of the diet appears to have been benefited. The "Graham System" of dieting suffered from withering criticism at the time. He published in 1837 a little book entitled, "Bread and Bread Making," bearing on its cover the scriptural quotation "Bread strengtheneth man's heart." He says in this volume: But while the people of our country are entirely given up as they are at present, to gross and promiscuous feeding on the dead carcasses of animals and to the untiring pursuit of wealth, it is perhaps wholly vain for a single individual to raise his voice on a subject of this kind. The well-known work of Chittenden has shown that when the protein intake is reduced by one half or less of that which the average American appetite suggests, professional men, soldiers and athletes may be maintained in the best physical condition. One of Yale's champion intercollegiate athletes won all the events of the year in which he was entered while living on a reduced protein or Chittenden diet. Upon such a diet, or less than that, the people of Germany are now living to-day. The principle involves eating meat very sparingly, taking half a piece where one would have formerly been taken, and using it only for its flavor. The wing of a chicken has little meat on it and yet if eaten together with vegetables it gives the meal a different quality than it would have had without it, and to this extent its use is warranted. The muscles are active when hard labor is done, but the muscles do not need meat for the performance of their work. A fasting man may have considerable power. The popular idea of the necessity of meat for a laboring man may be epitomized in the statement: a strong man can eat more meat than a weak one, hence meat makes a man strong. The proposition is evidently absurd.