James Simpson: excerpt from a speech of 1854

"Why did Moses permit them to put away their wives? Christ says, Moses permitted this for the hardness of their hearts, showing that these things were permitted when the Jewish nation was not perceptible of a higher level of truth and morals. What we found in the Bible was, therefore, to be carefully looked at in connection with other circumstances, or we might follow fallen examples instead of high principles. It was in this way that slavery was justified by the slaveholder, and so the capital punishment man drew his sanction; but if they went further they would find other principles taught, such as the command to do good to those who hate us and ill treat us. The great thing, then, was not to look at the facts and history of Scripture apart from the principles of Scripture, and they would thus find that there were many things recorded that they were not obliged to act out, but that they had to follow the great and high principles of truth and goodness." From a talk on vegetarian values and experience of the diet given on October 6th, 1854 at the New Jerusalem School, Accrington by the first President of the Vegetarian Society. Text taken from The Vegetarian Messenger (November 1854)

'Vegetarian lecture in Manchester' (1856)

An address by the Bible Christian founder of the early American Vegetarian Society during a hiatus from his Philadelphia chapel to prepare James Clark for ministry.

From The Vegetarian Messenger (April 1856)

See also: 'The Bible and Vegetarianism' (1853)

Quotation: Samuel Hopgood Hart (1925)

"It is of no use to cry 'Peace, Peace' where there can be no peace, and there can be no peace in partnership with cruelty and bloodshed. God's mercy is over all His works."

Excerpt taken from 'Why be a vegetarian? - some arguments from the religious standpoint' - a lecture delivered to the Croydon Vegetarian Society and published in The Vegetarian News (November 1925 edition)

Hart portrait

'Civilisation and Diet' by the Rev. J. Bruce Wallace, M.A.

An address delivered to a conference held at Ballycastle, Co. Antrim from May 28th-30th, 1932 for the purpose of inaugurating a Humanitarian and Food Reform Society for Northern Ireland.

From The Vegetarian News (July 1932)

'Vegetarianism' by Bramwell Booth (1900)

An early Salvation Army contribution to the subject which remained on the fringe of vegetarian ideology throughout the twentieth century.

From The Vegetarian Messenger (December, 1900)

See also: 'Food reformers and the Salvation Army' and 'The Death of General Booth'

From The Vegetarian Messenger and Health Review (July 1913 edition) - issued as a tract by the Vegetarian Society in the same year.

'Vegetarianism as a factor in religious life' by Rev. Philip C. Whiteman, B.A.

Rev. Whiteman was the last in a line of Ministers to serve the Bible Christian Church of Salford which promulgated the vegetarian ideal since 1809.

The denomination was dissolved in 1932, after which Rev. Whiteman returned to his native Unitarian Ministry.

The above text appeared in the October 1939 edition of The Vegetarian Messenger and Health Review and was reprinted as a Vegetarian Society tract in 1940. See: sermon

'Vegetarianism in the early Christian Church' by William E. A. Axon

Transcript of a lecture by a Bible Christian officer of the Vegetarian Society who later served as its President. The text was originally published in the October 1893 edition of The Vegetarian Messenger and reprinted as a tract in the following year.

See also: 'Saint Monacella's Lambs' and 'Early Christian Bishops Vegetarian' by the same author

'Is the Vegetarian right?' by the Rev. Professor C.J. Cadoux

From The Vegetarian Messenger and Health Review, May 1942

See: Obituary

'Vegetarianism and the extension of God's Kingdom on Earth' by Ronald M. Lightowler

Transcript of an address by the Secretary of the London Vegetarian Society which appeared in the July/August 1963 edition of The British Vegetarian