Tolstoy was a noted thinker on vegetarianism and non-violence, and even made it the subject of several philosophical essays. He gives impassioned, eloquent moral arguments not to eat animals, ones that any modern eater should consider.
"The First Step" is an essay written in 1891, exposing complete non-violence, stemming from vegetarianism, debating the presence of hypocrisy in a Christian or Pagan claim to be virtuous without practicing vegetarianism.