SUMMARY (Ridvan Askin, edited by Deborah Madsen):

According to Shew in this "Preface to the American Edition," William Lambe's book was first published in England in 1815, under the title Additional Reports on the Effects of a Peculiar Regimen; in Cases of Cancer, Scrofula, Consumption, Asthma, and other Chronic Diseases. Shew changed the title for the American publication. As he explains, he also

changed many of the technical or scientific terms to such as will be better understood by the generality of readers. Numerous typographical errors, and some other mistakes, which had crept into the London edition, I have also corrected. I have likewise taken the liberty of omitting many of the marginal references; of the former edition, references which were, for the most part, made either to works that are not accessible to American readers, or to those of foreign languages, which also are not here to be obtained (iii).

Shew notes that veganism “is destined to do yet a vast amount of good in the prevention and cure of disease, in the United States,” adding: “I feel myself too thankful for the great benefit I have received by adopting it for the most part during a period of nine years, to remain silent on the subject” (iii). He “recommend[s] that all who make the experiment of vegetable diet, pursue at the same time a course of bathing, with an observance of good hygienic habits generally, such as are recommended in water-cure” (iv).

Lambe's book is divided into two parts. Part 1 discusses the errors and mistakes of common medical practice, the curative powers of water, the nature of disease and mortality, the advantages of veganism, arguments against veganism, and Temperance. Part 2 presents a series of of case studies. Lambe maintains that the use of animal food is mere habit, and that vegans tend to be healthier and less prone to disease (55-58). Indeed, “that longevity is promoted by vegetable regimen,” he asserts, “is established by the concurrence of numerous and authentic observations” (60). Thus, Lambe vehemently insists that “[a]ll the notions of vegetable diet affording only a deficient nutriment … are wholly groundless” (75), whereas the use of “animal food is,” among other things, “unfavorable to the intellectual powers” (84) and, exacerbating this effect, the abuse of alcohol “is, in some measure, a necessary concomitant and appendage to the use of animal food” (131).

Lambe's primary reason in favor of veganism is that “no other matter is suited to the organs of man, as indicated by his structure” (89) and “[t]his applies then with the same force to eggs, milk, cheese, and fish, as to flesh meat” (90). Fish “is the most unfavorable to health and longevity” (90). Conversely, “fruit, and the produce of trees in general, instead of being unwholesome, is the sort of matter the most suited to the organs of man” (97). Lambe describes pejoratively the eating habits of different communities in order to argue that flesh-eating is a remnant or left-over of “the condition of the savage” (125). He promotes a purely agricultural society, without any animal farming, as a society of peace: “It seems no visionary or romantic speculation to conjecture that if all mankind confined themselves for their support to the productions supplied by the culture of the earth, war, with its attendant misery and horrors, might cease to be one of the scourges of the human race” (126). “[R]eason” is always “in favor of simple diet” (129).

In addition to his own Preface and editorial revisions, Shew's contribution to the volume consists of annotations and comments that add detail, historical exposition, and observations from his personal experience.