In the Spirit of prophecy we are told that flesh is not the best food, and that it is to our advantage to discontinue its use. "It is a mistake to suppose that muscular strength depends on the use of animal food. The needs of the system can be better supplied and more vigorous health can be enjoyed, without its use. The grains, with fruits, nuts, and vegetables, contain all the nutritive properties necessary to make good blood. These elements are not so well or so fully supplied by a flesh diet. Had the use of flesh been essential to health and strength, animal food would have been included in the diet appointed man in the beginning."—Ministry of Healing, p. 316. (See also Counsels on Health, p. 115.)
The following are a few quotations from some outstanding nutritional authorities which emphasize the accuracy of the foregoing statements:
"The lactovegetarian diet, or combination of vegetable foods and milk, is however, easy to plan so as to be highly nutritious, and to promote optimal health. . . . Muscle meats are less valuable as supplements for vegetable foods than are milk, eggs, and glandular organs, - since they are less rich in most of the vitamins, contain a poorly constituted mineral mixture that is low in calcium."—MCCOLLUM, ORENTKEILES, and DAY, The Newer Knowledge of Nutrition, (5th ed.; Macmillan, 1942), pp. 563-4.
"Liebig, the first great student of protein in nutrition, thought that meat, being most like man's muscle, would be most efficient in replacing it. He had no idea that all proteins are literally taken to pieces in the digestive tract and all the parts (amino acids) reassembled by the cells according to their needs. Liebig's notion has been slow in giving way to the newer conception of the place of protein in nutrition, and many spend money in maintaining a traditionally high amount of meat in the diet who might be using their money to better advantage in obtaining a better supply of minerals and vitamins. The regard in which meat is held is probably largely due to its peculiar texture and to certain substances found in its juices which give it a pronounced and agreeable flavor and exert a stimulating effect upon appetite and digestion...
"As regards satisfying real body needs, meat proteins are by no means superior to all others. In fact, the proteins provided by nature for building body protein during the growth of the young are found in milk and eggs. The value of milk as a source of protein for growth cannot be disputed. . . .
"Milk and eggs are not only adequate substitutes for meat, but they carry in addition a rich supply of minerals and vitamins which will have to be added to the meat ration to make it equally valuable with either of the other two. The housewife who provides a somewhat varied diet, ample in fuel value, including milk and eggs, need not feel that she is depriving her family of any essential if she furnishes a very small amount of meat or none at all."—MARY SWARTZ ROSE, Feeding the Family, (4th ed.; Macmillan, 1941), pp. 121, 122.
"Meats (including fish and poultry). Rich in protein or fat or both, but showing, in general, about the same calcium and vitamin deficiencies as do the grains, except that the meats contain more riboflavin and nicotinic acid. . . .
"Milk. Important as source of energy, protein, mineral elements, and vitamins. The most efficient of all foods in making good the deficiencies of grain products and in ensuring the all-around adequacy of the diet.
"It becomes apparent that a dietary made up, as so many American dietaries are, too largely of breadstuffs, meats, sweets, and fats, may be satisfying to the palate and to the traditional demand for variety, may furnish ample protein and calories with fats and carbohydrates in any desired proportions, and yet may fall far short of furnishing optimal amounts of some of the mineral elements and vitamins. We now understand how it is that liberal allowances of fruits, vegetables, and milk in its various forms, serve (in ways which until recently could not be fully appreciated) to make an ordinary dietary or food supply more conductive to optimal nutrition and health."
"So-called 'high milk' dietaries, resulted in an increase in all the outstanding factors of food value, with no increase in the total cost. Furthermore, the improvement was greatest at the point at which it was probably most needed, i.e., in the calcium content of the dietary ; and there was an undoubtedly very important increase in the riboflavin content and vitamin A value as well.
"The cheapness of breadstuffs and the efficiency with which milk supplements them, give rise to the saying that 'the dietary should be built around bread and milk.'
"Vegetables and fruit taken as a group may be ranked next after grain products and milk in importance as constituents of an economical and well-balanced diet. Like milk they tend to correct both the mineral and the vitamin deficiencies of the grain products; and in a sense they supplement the milk also in that many of the vegetables and fruits are rich in iron or vitamin C, or both.
"The dietaries in which milk, vegetables, and fruit (together) were prominent averaged lower in cost and higher in energy, protein, phosphorus, calcium, and iron; and undoubtedly they also had higher vitamin values.
"Liver has therapeutic value in pernicious anemia; but Rose finds that for normal nutrition, including the requirements of rapidly growing children, eggs do all that liver can do. Obviously, then, if one of these is to be emphasized in the teaching of nutrition and food values to the public, it should be the egg."—HENRY C. SHERMAN, Chemistry of Food and Nutrition, (6th ed.; Macmillan, 1941), pp. 508, 512, 533.
"For normal adult maintenance the usual allowance is about i gram of food protein per day per kilogram of body weight, Lewis (1942) states it as his opinion, and as the general consensus of opinion of students of the subject, that this allowance is half again to twice as high as the average of actual need. This we believe to be a sufficiently safe margin to cover individual variations (of need, and among dietaries) without complicating the 'protein standard.' . . . It is of far-reaching importance that this fact be effectively assimilated into our thinking, for in the world view of food problems, which must be accepted as one of the responsibilities of the present generation and its successors, there may not be enough animal protein to provide for the didaries of all people as much as some of the Western groups of people have sought to incorporate in their standard of living. It should be universally recognized as now known, and as good citizenship to act upon the knowledge, that all scientifically sound protein standards can be met in terms of foods of which the readily potential supplies are sufficient to go around."—HENRY C. SHERmAN, The Science of Nutrition (Columbia -University Press, 1943), p. 25.
"As long as this country has access to a plentiful supply of calories, and a variety of whole grain cereals and legumes, it is most unlikely that impairment of health from protein deficiency will ever occur. . . .
"There are definite psychological problems of convincing a population used to eating a high protein diet that one of much lower protein content, and low in animal protein, will not necessarily impair health. Lumberjacks may demand plenty of red meat to get timber cut, but that demand rests on habit and not on a nutritional or medical basis.
"Post-war feeding operations in war-torn countries will demand large amounts of protein foods until the agricultural economy of those lands can be restored to such a level that they can contribute effectively to their own nutritional support. But there are protein foods that could be made available in this and other countries; protein foods which are stable and of which stock piles could be created for the time when they are needed in large amounts; protein foods which are superior not only in protein but in other essential nutrients. We refer specifically to wheat germ, corn germ, yeasts, dried legumes, and the various products which can be made from peanuts and soybeans. There is sufficient exPerimental evidence in animal nutrition that the vegetable proteins we have mentioned are high quality proteins."
"Calorie intake from carbohydrates and fat spares protein, and in the presence of sufficient calories from non-protein sources, the amount of protein in the ordinary diet of an active adult may be safely reduced to 50 grams per day, of which as little as 5 grams may be in the form of animal protein. The experimental evidence supporting this latter statement is limited to an 8-week observation period; however, there is no reason to suspect that it would not hold for much longer periods."—American Journal of Public Health, 33:1444-1450; 1943, art., "Some Medical Aspects of Protein Foods" by Fredrick J. Stare, M.D., and George W. Thorn, M.D.
"Undoubtedly, the more open-minded we are in using the guidance of the newer knowledge of nutrition for greater efficiency in food management, the more extensively will we meet our needs through grain products, fruits, vegetables, and milk."—HENRY C. SHERMAN, "Nutritional Improvement of Life," Journal American Dietetic Association 22:580, July, 1946.
