Note 51 — VI. PLUTARCH. 40–120 A.D. (?)
Reading edition
See Περὶ Σαρκοφαγίας Λόγος—in the Latin title, De Esu Carnium—“On Flesh-Eating,” Parts 1 and 2. We shall here add the authority of Pliny, who professes his conviction that “the plainest food is the most beneficial.” (Hist. Nat. xi., 117); and asserts that it is from his eating that man derives most of his diseases. (xxv., 28.) Compare the feeling of Ovid, whom we have already quoted—Metamorphoses xv. We may here refer our readers also to the celebration, by the same poet, of the innocent and peaceful gifts of Ceres, and of the superiority of her pure table and altar—Fasti iv., 395–416.
Pace, Ceres, læta est. At vos optate, Coloni, Perpetuam pacem, perpetuumque ducem. Farra Deæ, micæque licet salientis honorem Detis: et in veteres turea grana focos. Et, si thura aberant, unctas accendite tædas. Parva bonæ Cereri, sint modo casta, placent. A Bove succincti cultros removete ministri: Bos aret * * * * * Apta jugo cervix non est ferienda securi: Vivat, et in durâ sæpe laboret humo.
And the fine picture of Virgil of the agricultural life in the ideal “Golden Age,” in which slaughter for food and war was unknown:—
Ante Impia quam cæsis gens est epulata juvencis. “Before An impious world the labouring oxen slew.”—Georgics II.