The flesh of dead animals was not the original food for man. Man was permitted to eat it after the Flood because all vegetation had been destroyed. But the curse pronounced upon man and the earth and every living thing has made strange and wonderful changes. Since the Flood the human race has been shortening its period of existence. Physical, mental, and moral degeneracy is rapidly increasing in these latter days.—Manuscript 3, 1897. 3SM 289.1