22 THE MEAT FETISH.
It is a part of the business of man to mould his environment, and help to create the environment of posterity; and even in the case of our own bodies, if after so many years of a mistaken diet it proved to be difficult to return to the right path, it would still be our duty to make the attempt. It is little short of miraculous that the return should be so easy. Ages ago, and before the historical period, our ancestors rose from a condition of cannibalism, and doubtless the medicine-men of the time took the conservative side, and they really had a good deal to say for themselves. Men had always been cannibals, and in some respects the devouring of an enemy slain in battle is less shocking than the eating of a pet lamb or a family cow. But the reform made its way notwithstanding, and if I am not mistaken, we are bound just as surely to advance beyond the system of quasi-cannibalism in which we live, and which has no justification except the fact that it has always existed.
