“The barbarous and unfeeling sports (as they are called) of the English--their horse-racing, hunting, shooting, bull and bear baiting, cock-fighting,[209] prize-fighting, and the like, all proceed from their immoderate addiction to animal food. Their natural temper is thereby corrupted, and they are in the habitual and hourly commission of crimes against nature, justice, and humanity, from which a feeling and reflective mind, unaccustomed to such a diet, would revolt, but in which they profess to take delight. The kings of England have from a remote period, been devoted to hunting; in which pursuit one of them, and the son of another lost his life. James I., according to Scaliger, was merciful, except at the chase, where he was cruel, and was very much enraged when he could not catch the Stag. ‘God,’ he used to say, ‘is enraged against me, so that I shall not have him.’ Whenever he had caught his victim, he would put his arm all entire into his belly and entrails. This anecdote may be paralleled with the following of one of his successors: ‘The hunt on Tuesday last, (March 1st, 1784), commenced near Salthill, and afforded a chase of upwards of fifty miles. His Majesty was present at the death of the stag near Tring, in Herts. It is the first deer that has been ran to death for many months; and when opened, the heart strings were found to be quite rent, as is supposed, with the force of running.’[210] _Siste, vero, tandem carnifex!_ The slave trade, that abominable violation of the rights of Nature, is most probably owing to the same cause, as well as a variety of violent acts, both national and personal, which usually are attributed to other motives. In the sessions of Parliament, 1802, a majority of the members voted for the continuance of bull-baiting, and some of them had the confidence to plead in favour of it.”[211] Ritson enforces his observations upon this head by citing Plutarch, Cowper, and Pope (in the _Guardian, No. 61_--a most forcible and eloquent protest against the cruelties of “sport” and of gluttony).[212] In his fifth chapter he traces the origin of human sacrifices to the practice of flesh eating:--