Hitler's Table Talk

PRAISE OF THE VEGETARIAN DIET 443
tribes which are primarily vegetarian develop more harmoniously
than those of the tribes in which it is customary for
the mother to feed her infant up to the age of four or five. As
regards animals, the dog, which is carnivorous, cannot compare
in performance with the horse, which is vegetarian. In the
same way, the lion shows signs of fatigue after covering two or
three kilometres, while the camel marches for six or seven days
before even his tongue begins to hang out. Speaking generally,
the experts do not take facts sufficiently into consideration. It
has been proved that a vegetarian diet—and particularly a diet
of potato peelings and raw potatoes—will cure beri-beri within
a week.
Those who adopt a vegetarian diet must remember that it is
in their raw state that vegetables have their greatest nutritive
value. The fly feeds on fresh leaves, the frog swallows the fly
as it is, and the stork eats the living frog. Nature thus teaches us
that a rational diet should be based on eating things in their
raw state. Science has proved, too, that cooking destroys the
vitamins, which are the most valuable part of our food. It has
not yet been established beyond doubt whether cooking
destroys merely certain chemical particles or whether it also
destroys the essential fermentive juices.
Our children to-day are much healthier than those of the
Imperial and Weimar Republic periods because mothers now
realise that they contribute far more to the health of their
children if they give them raw vegetables and roots to chew
than if they give them boiled milk.
199 Reich Chancellery, 26th April 1942, midday
Artistes and politics.
While lunching hurriedly at the Chancellery before attending a session
of the Reichstag, Dr. Gb'bbels told the Fuehrer of some of his experiences
with artistes in politics. He said that recently he had had to protest
again to Jannings about making remarks hostile to the régime. It was
with reluctance that Jannings eventually admitted that, in his love of
animated conversation, he may have said things which could be misconstrued
and enlarged upon to the detriment of the prestige of the State.
The Fuehrer replied: