Page:Guide to health.djvu/54

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42
A GUIDE TO HEALTH

richer classes of China and Japan, the richer Mussalmans of India, as well as those rich Hindus who have no religious scruples about taking meat. (3) To the third class belong the uncivilised peoples of the frigid zones, who live on an exclusive meat diet. These are not very numerous, and they also introduce a vegetable element into their diet, wherever they come in contact with the civilised races of Europe. Man, then, can live on three kinds of diet; but it is our duty to consider which of these is the healthiest for us.

An examination of the structure of the human body leads to the conclusion that man is intended by Nature to live on a vegetable diet. There is the closest affinity between the organs of the human body and those of the fruit-eating animals. The monkey, for instance, is so similar to man in shape and structure, and it is a fruit-eating animal. Its teeth and stomach are just like the teeth and stomach of man. From this we may infer that man is intended to live on roots and fruits, and not on meat.

Scientists have found out by experiments that fruits have in them all the elements that are required for man's sustenance. The plantain, the orange, the date, the grape, the apple, the almond, the walnut, the groundnut, the cocoanut,—all these fruits contain a large percentage of nutritious