It is strange that philosophers first show how one animal supports itself by destroying another, and then enter into discussions on the apparent admi… - Lewis Gompertz

But so far from there being an alliance between ethicks and physics, nearly all Nature’s works are at war with each other, the good of the one being derived from the injury of the other. But when pointed out to the vegetarians that carnivorous animals thrive on, and require animal food, they say it is right that they should use it, but that man being superior, should not.
Now this does seem inconsistent, as right and wrong are absolute without reference to one animal more than another; and it is not the superiority or inferiority of either aggressive party which can establish the justice, but the effects on the victims are the points at issue. The vegetarians would reply however, that man was not formed for animal diet, and that the carnivori were; but this is not taking up the question on moral grounds, on the supposition that man was formed for it (as many persons believe), because the formation of man would not determine the justice, unless that it should explain the intention of God, but which I think they would find a difficulty to show.

The number of animals which can be brought into existence probably being limited, or the number destined to inhabit our globe probably being so; it appearing reasonable to think that no new animals are created by being born, nor destroyed by being killed, but that being born is merely becoming conscious, and death or sleep being only a loss or suspension of consciousness, [...] the identity never being destroyed.

Suppose it were so; so much, then, the better, as we should not want then to show that the soul could become torpid and recover; because, then, it would never be torpid> and, consequently, would be immortal, which is all we want to prove. And this opinion, I believe, is that of the majority of thinking persons, but unfortunately mixed up with divers principles, not orthodox, some of them acknowledging a soul m man, but not in any other living being; others going one step further, and admitting a soul in other animals too, but imagining that it is a different sort of soul to that of man, instead of considering that one soul is similar to another, and that all the difference between one individual and another is corporeal,—the organization of the body or brain, by its variations, alone producing, it would appear, all the varieties of character, without any variation of soul, to which conclusion we are led by the fact that we cannot produce any thought or feeling in the mind but through the instrumentality of the body; and it seems only on the bodily organs, and physical agents upon them, that every perfection and defect of mind depends; an idiot, a philosopher, and a mouse, appearing to have quite similar souls, the difference only being in the organs of sense, which act upon the souls, and are in themselves different. No person can deny that different sensations are produced by bodily causes; why, then, must we look to something else to produce them—namely, to variations of the soul ? Bodily causes are enough, and we are not driven to seek for further causes. The soul is always, if I am correct, the same. It does not grow, it does not decay; and is as perfect in an infant as In a man—the improvement and growth of mind being only of the corporeal part.