Fifty years of food reform : a history of the vegetarian movement in England / by Charles W. Forward.

Forward, Charles W. (Charles Walter)

Date:: 1898

Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Fifty years of food reform : a history of the vegetarian movement in England / by Charles W. Forward. Source: Wellcome Collection.

21/212 (page 7)

NICHOLSON—CO W HERD—LA MBE. Brahmin and Buddhist religions. On his return to England Oswald adopted the dress and manners of the followers of Siddartha, becoming an abstainer from ilesh-food and cultivating such an abhor- rence of the abattoir that he would make a long detour in order to avoid passing a butcher’s shop. He brought up his chil- dren in accordance with his views, and appears to have died, together with his sons, fighting in La Vendee for the cause of the Revolution, which he had gone to Paris to support. His work, “ The Cry of Nature: An Appeal to Mercy and to Justice on behalf of the Persecuted Animals,” was published two years pre- vious to his death. This work is a laboured and comprehensive review of the Vegetarian position, and forms a remark- able protest against the habit of flesh- eating. Six years later, George Nicholson, a much younger man, published a work, en- titled, “ On the Conduct of Man to In- ferior Animals,” and, in 1801, “The Primeval Diet of Man : Arguments in Favour of Vegetable Food, with Remarks on Man’s Conduct to [other] Animals. ” Nicholson was born at Bradford, and by trade a printer and publisher—in fact the pioneer of cheap popular literature of the best class. He resided successively in Manchester, Poughnill (near Ludlow), and Stourport. “ He possessed in an eminent degree, strength of intellect, with universal benevolence and undeviating up- rightness of conduct.” * In 1807, William Cowherd, the first founder of the “ Bible Christian Church,” formally advanced, as cardinal doctrines of his religious system, the principle of abstinence from flesh-eating to which “ the medical arguments of Dr. Cheyne and the humanitarian sentiments of St. Pierre ” appear to have converted him. Cowherd was born at Carnforth in 1763. On coming to Manchester he obtained a curacy under the Rev. J. Clowes, a preacher of the Established Church, who had been attracted by the theological doctrines of Emanuel Swedenborg. Cow- herd adopted the teachings of the great Swedish theologian, and, after resigning the post of curate, preached for a time in the Swedenborgian temple in Peter Street. Not finding, however, the freedom of opinion he expected, he decided to pro- mulgate his own views and convictions independently, and, with this object, he built, at his own expense, ChristChurch, King Street, Salford, in the year 1800. Here his intense earnestness, combined with marked eloquence and ability, at- tracted a considerable following. With the Apostle Paul, he appears to have held the opinion that it was incumbent upon Christian ministers to earn a livelihood by some “ secular ” labour, and for the better accomplishment of this object he opened a boarding-school, amongst his assistants therein being William Metcalfe, James Clark, and J. Scholefield, of whom it will be necessary to speak later on. Cowherd built an institute in connection with his church at Hulme, and it was here that James Gaskill presided, subse- quently, at his death, leaving an endow- ment for its perpetuation as an educa- tional establishment. Cowherd numbered amongst his fol- lowers Mr. Joseph Brotherton, M.P., one of the presidents of the Vegetarian Society with whose work it will be neces- sary to deal in a subsequent chapter. William Cowherd died in 1816, and was buried in front of his chapel, in King Street, Salford. Two years previously to this Dr. William Lambe issued his “ Additional Reports,” in which (writing in the third person) he explains that he suffered from his eighteenth year with constantly aggra- vated symptoms. “ He resolved, therefore, finally to execute what he had been contemplating for some time—to abandon animal food altogether, and everything analagous to it, and to confine himself wholly to vegetable food. I his determination he put into execution the second week of February, 1806, and he has adhered to it with perfect regularity to the present time. His only subject of repentance with regard-to it has been that it had not been adopted much earlier in life. He never found the smallest real ill-consequence from this change. He sank neither in flesh, strength, nor in spirits. He was at all times of a very thin and slender habit, and so he has con- tinued to be, but on the whole he has rather * The Gentleman's Magazine (xcv.).