The Worthington advance. [volume] (Worthington, Minn.) 1874-1908, 1892-08-18
CLIMATE AND FOOD.
The Two Things Which Make Nation,
just What They Are.

The Two Things Which Make Nation,
Just What They Are.
In the structure of his teeth and the
organs of digestion, man more CLOSELY
resembles his nearer relatives of the
ape and monkey tribe, who are vege.
tarians, than he does his more distan,
relations, the carnivora. Yet there are
differences of structure which clearly
separate him from the former as well
as the latter class. and which justify III
in ranking him as omnivorous. anc
adaptable in his dietetic habits to vary
ing conditions of climatic and social en-.
vironment. If any argument is needed
for further scientific rebuttal of the ex
IRENE vegetarian view it may be found
in the universal experience of the race
The further back we go in human his
tory, the nearer we approach, appar
emily, not a condition OF pure vegetar
ianis,n, but on the contrary more gen
eral and universal use of animal food.
Men were hunters and fishermen be
fore they adopted a pastoral or agricul
tural life, living almost exclusively
upon the products of the chase and the
resources of the sea. In the ancient
''kitchen middens'' of Europe and
America, mingled with the shells an6
bones of fish, we find animal and some
times even human bones, on which the
marks of human teeth clearly reveal
the uses to which they were put. And
If we assume before this stage of human
evolution a social or unsocial state.
when men lived exclusively on the
products of the soil, an assumption
which has no warrant in the accessible
testimony of archaeology or history, we
must imagine the condition of man
then to have been similar to that of the
Digger indian or certain of the hill
tribes If Hindostan, who rank among
the lowest extant specimens of the HUI
man race.
Looking at this question from the
climatic standpoint, we find in the
tropical regions a predominance, but
not an exclusive prevalence of the veRe-
tartan habit, while in the Arctic re-
glons the native races resort almost en-
tirely to the use of animal food. In
neither of these regions do we find the
human race in its highest perfection.
Civilization received its primary i'm.
pulse and has achieved its most notable
success in the temperate zone, and
among races which are neither exclus-
lively vegetarian nor exclusively car.
nivorous in their habits.
The modern American and European.
rs is well known, is descendant of
one or more branches of the ancient
Aryan or 1ndo-European stock It 50
happens that one branch of this stock,
which early separated from its Euro
pean cousins and travelled southwark to
people the mountains and plains of In.
dia, through stress of climatic and re-
ligious influences, became as nearly ex-
clusively vegetarian in its habits az
any large section of the human race
has ever been and has remained SO for
centuries Here, then, is an opportu-
nifty for comparison.
The effect of the vegetarian habit,
superadded to climatic conditions, has
been to develop a race notable indeed
tor some of its intellectual traits, but
inferior in size, lacking in physical
stamina and energy of character, whose
millions of people easily fell prey first
to Mohamme dan and afterward to tho
English, whose commercial ENTERPRISE
for centuries has proved inferior to that
of the small competing race of the Par.
sees-theiE nearer blood relationship
which has shown itself lacking in thosa
essential traits which charaete,,as orv
a'ot'eri', progressive civil;zattua 1bA
great and successful men Of all area
hAve been those who have not departed
TOO widely from the mixed diet which
mas long constituted the habit of the
races which have peopled the temperate
rP'sps Of the serth.-gaoq