(SLAVERY AND ABOLITION.) LAY, BENJAMIN. Benjamin Lay. Stipple engraving 8-7/8 by 7-3/8 inches printed on India proof paper, mounted to a larger sheet (larger sheet, 10 x 8) with the caption. Np, circa 1850's, from an earlier engraving
an uncommon portrait of the noted 18th century social reformer, abolitionist and vegetarian. Benjamin Lay (1682-1789) was barely over four feet tall and wore clothes that he made himself. He was a hunchback with a projecting chest, and his arms were almost longer than his legs. He was a vegetarian, and drank only milk and water. He would wear nothing, nor eat anything made from the loss of animal life or provided by any degree by slave labor. He was distinguished less for his eccentricities than for his philanthropy. He published over 200 pamphlets, most of which were impassioned polemics against various social institutions of the time, particularly slavery, capital punishment, the prison system, and the moneyed Pennsylvania Quaker elite. Refusing to participate in what he described in his tracts as a degraded, hypocritical, tyrannical, and even demonic society, Lay was committed to a lifestyle of almost complete self-sustenance. Dwelling in a cottage in the Pennsylvania countryside, Lay grew his own food and made his own clothes.
