________________
6.- VEGETARIANISM - A COMPASSIONATE APPROACH TO LIFE
smell, sight and hearing. The more the number of senses the more evolved the life is. Vegetables are one-sense beings having the sense of touch and animals are five-sense beings having all the five senses. Life has to go through a laborious and strenuous process to evolve from one sense beings to five-sense beings. By slaughtering an animal. one completely destroys the evolutionary progress of that life, which it has attained through suffering and pain. The vegetable kingdom has not yet reached the blood "consciousness" which the animals and humans have. So, the degree of pain is less. Where there is blood, there are more feelings, more emotions and possibility to feel deep pain. So, one agrees that for living violence is inevitable, but one has the choice to minimize violence.
Two thousand six hundred years ago, Mahävir, the great exponent of non-violence and compassion emphasized that the thoughts that govern our actions are the products of the food we eat. The food that feeds the system has a definite influence on the person physically as well emotionally, psychologically and spiritually. Healthy, whole and harmless foods give rise to healthy whole and harmless thoughts. Once the thoughts are harmless and healthy, the actions also reflect the same qualities. Weakness in character always develops in those who are in poor health, mentally or physically.
Science has discovered in recent years that character and personality are attributes of the inner workings of the body and have a great bearing upon our success in life and in our happiness. The personality reveals and expresses itself through the physical body. The expression of the face, the smile, which is the manifestation of joy, happiness and compassion, reveal the personality within. Without a healthy body, these manifestations are not possible.
Thus, vegetarianism is one of the many ways of expressing our reverence for all life forms including ourselves - from the minutest micro-beings to the macro-beings, from the lowest developed consciousness to the highest developed consciousness.
THE BOOK OF COMPASSION
43
