21. If, however, some one should, nevertheless, think it is unjust to destroy brutes, such a one should neither use milk, nor wool, nor sheep, nor honey. For, as you injure a man by taking from him his garments, thus, also, you injure a sheep by shearing it. For the wool which you take from it is its vestment. Milk, likewise, was not produced for you, but for the young of the animal that has it. The bee also collects honey as food for itself; which you, by taking away, administer to your own pleasure. I pass over in silence the opinion of the Egyptians, that we act unjustly by meddling with plants. But if these things were produced for our sake, then the bee, being ministrant to us, elaborates honey, and the wool grows on the back of sheep, that it may be an ornament to us, and afford us a bland heat. 22. Co-operating also with the Gods themselves in what contributes to piety, we sacrifice animals: for, of the Gods, Apollo, indeed, is called λυκοκτονος, _the slayer of wolves_; and Diana, θηροκτονος, _the destroyer of wild beasts_. Demi-gods likewise, and all the heroes who excel us both in origin and virtue, have so much approved of the slaughter of animals, that they have sacrificed to the Gods _Dodeceïdes_[22] and _Hecatombs_. But Hercules, among other things, is celebrated for being an _ox-devourer_. 23. It is, however, stupid to say that Pythagoras exhorted men to abstain from animals, in order that he might, in the greatest possible degree, prevent them from eating each other. For, if all men at the time of Pythagoras were anthropophagites, he must be delirious who drew men away from other animals, in order that they might abstain from devouring each other. For, on this account, he ought rather to have exhorted them to become anthropophagites, by showing them that it was an equal crime to devour each other, and to eat the flesh of oxen and swine. But if men at that time did not eat each other, what occasion was there for this dogma? And if he established this law for himself and his associates, the supposition that he did so is disgraceful. For it demonstrates that those who lived with Pythagoras were anthropophagites. 24. For we say that the very contrary of what he conjectured would happen. For, if we abstained from animals, we should not only be deprived of pleasure and riches of this kind, but we should also lose our fields, which would be destroyed by wild beasts; since the whole earth would be occupied by serpents and birds, so that it would be difficult to plough the land; the scattered seeds would immediately be gathered by the birds; and all such fruits as had arrived at perfection, would be consumed by quadrupeds. But men being oppressed by such a want of food, would be compelled, by bitter necessity, to attack each other.