Vegan and Vegetarian Quotes

The following vegan and vegetarian quotes are attributed to a broad range of famous vegans and vegetarians.  For many people, these and similar quotations / personal perspectives have proved a source of inspiration, promoting reflection regarding the moral, cultural and health-related merits of veganism and contributing to their decision to adopt a vegan or vegetarian lifestyle.

"I would not enter on my list of friends (Though graced with polish'd manners and fine sense, Yet wanting sensibility) the man Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm".

William Cowper (1731-1800), Winter Walk at Noon, book vi, line 1

"If a group of beings from another planet were to land on Earth - beings who considered themselves as superior to you as you feel yourself to be to other animals - would you concede them the rights over you that you assume over other animals?"

George Bernard Shaw, playwright and Nobel prize winner 1925

"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated".

Mahatma Gandhi, statesman and philosopher

"The time will come when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals as they now look on the murder of men".

Leonardo da Vinci, artist and scientist

"People get offended by animal rights campaigns. It's ludicrous. It's not as bad as mass animal death in a factory".

Richard Gere, actor

"A human can be healthy without killing animals for food. Therefore if he eats meat he participates in taking animal life merely for the sake of his appetite".

Leo Tolstoy

"If any kid ever realized what was involved in factory farming they would never touch meat again.  I was so moved by the intelligence, sense of fun and personalities of the animals I worked with on Babe that by the end of the film I was a vegetarian".

James Cromwell

If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be vegetarian. We feel better about ourselves and better about the animals, knowing we're not contributing to their pain".

Paul and Linda McCartney

"I grew up in cattle country - that's why I became a vegetarian.  Meat stinks, for the animals, the environment, and your health".

K.D. Lang

"You ask people why they have deer heads on the wall.  They always say, "because it's such a beautiful animal".  There you go.  I think my mother's attractive, but I have photographs of her".

Ellen DeGeneres

"You have just dined, and however scrupulously the slaughterhouse is concealed in the graceful distance of miles, there is complicity".

Ralph Waldo Emerson

I think there will come a time, and this is down the road a great many years, when civilized people will look back in horror on our generation and the ones that have preceded it: the idea that we should eat other living things running around on four legs, that we should raise them just for the purpose of killing them! The people of the future will say, meat-eaters in disgust and regard us in the same way that we regard cannibals and cannibalism".

Dennis Weaver

"If present trends of meat-eating continue, then by 2050 the world's livestock will be consuming as much as 4 billion people do...when many were doubting whether such human numbers could be fed at all".

Award winning Science Writer: Colin Tudge, Penguin 2004