"While we ourselves are the living graves of murdered beasts, how can we expect any ideal conditions on this earth?"

(Irish playwright, critic, polemicist, political activist / vegetarian)

"If you are as you have described yourself the king of the animals — it would be better for you to call yourself king of the beasts since you are the greatest of them all! — why do you not help them so that they may presently be able to give you their young in order to gratify your palate, for the sake of which you have tried to make yourself a tomb for all the animals? Even more I might say if to speak the entire truth were permitted me."

(painter / vegetarian)

"(W)e should all be Vegetarians. For why should it be otherwise when Sir Henry Thompson calls it 'a vulgar error' to suppose that flesh-foods are indispensable for our sustenance, and the most eminent physiologists declare that fruit is the natural food of man" "the strongest and most useful animal, the horse, is a Vegetarian, while the most ferocious and practically useless animal, the lion, is a carnivore..."

(Activist, led the Indian independence movement against British rule / vegetarian)

"When about 16 years of age I happened to meet with a book, written by one Tryon [vegetarianism advocate Thomas Tryon], recommending a vegetable diet. I determined to go into it. My brother, being yet unmarried, did not keep house, but boarded himself and his apprentices in another family. My refusing to eat flesh occasioned an inconveniency, and I was frequently chid for my singularity."

(American polymath, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States / vegetarian)

"I became a vegetarian after realizing that animals feel afraid, cold, hungry and unhappy like we do. I feel very deeply about vegetarianism and the animal kingdom. It was my dog Boycott who led me to question the right of humans to eat other sentient beings."

(champion of farmer worker rights in the US, organized migrant workers from Mexico, Central and South America, co-founded the National Farm Workers Association / vegetarian)

"My staff does a great job of alerting people that I don’t eat meat, but if they’ve forgotten or the people seating me have forgotten, I just put the meat aside, cover it with salad, and pretend that I have really enjoyed my main course."

(French President and Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, Head of French Airline Unit at Air France-KLM, lawyer / vegetarian)

"[Being vegan] is a great approach to eating, which for me has given me enormous amounts of energy and clarity and the kind of clarity and energy people want in a president of the United States..."

(American politician, former U.S. Representative from Ohio (1997-2013), youngest person ever to be elected mayor in US history / vegetarian)

(Mexican revolutionary, 33rd President of Mexico (1911–13) / vegetarian)

“No addiction is good. I include alcohol. The only good addiction is love. Forget everything else.”

(40th President of Uruguay, 2010-2015)

"They are made to dance and perform in circuses and movies and television. Vegans and vegetarians are ridiculed and excluded for not eating animals."

(American author, activist, civil rights leader, and the wife of Martin Luther King / vegan)

"I think ‘vegan' is a beautiful word. It is more than just a description for our diet. I see it as a visible template for an ethical, healthy, responsible, and rational life. Because it describes our character, it says we do not take the life of another living being to satisfy our wants."

(former Vice-President of Citibank and was also General Manager at Citicorp)

“I didn’t give it a second thought. I realized that I was highly prone to arterial blockage, and I thought I’d cut my chances. I literally wanted to see if I could live to be a grandfather.”

(former US President / vegan)

"Over a year ago I changed my diet to a vegan diet, really just to experiment to see what it was like. … Now, for many people, that choice is connected to environmental ethics and health issues and all that stuff. … In a visceral way, I felt better, so I've continued with it and I'm likely to continue it for the rest of my life."

(former President of the USA / vegan)

"With the passing decades, Tesla shifted away from a meat diet. He substituted fish, always boiled, and finally eliminated the meat entirely. He later almost entirely eliminated the fish and lived on a vegetarian diet.

(Serbian-American inventor, electrical engineer, mechanical engineer, physicist, and futurist who is best known for his contributions to the design of the modern alternating current electricity supply system / vegetarian)