1540
Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam
[Canto 4, Ch. 30]
penances within the water, and they did not take any food for a very long time. They practiced these austerities not for material benediction but for the satisfaction of the Supreme Lord. One may engage in any business—material or spiritual—but the purpose should be the satisfaction of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. This verse presents a perfect picture of Vedic civilization. People training to become devotees should be respectful not only to the Supreme Personality of Godhead but also to those who are elderly in knowledge, who are Āryans and actual devotees of the Lord. An Āryan is one who does not boast but is an actual devotee of the Lord. Āryan means advanced. Formerly, those who claimed to be Āryans had to be devotees of the Lord. For instance, in  Bhagavad-gītā  Kṛṣṇa chastised Arjuna by saying that he was speaking like a non-Āryan.
śrī bhagavān uvāca 
  kutas tvā kaśmalam idaṁ 
  viṣame samupasthitam 
  anārya-juṣṭam asvargyam 
  akīrti-karam arjuna
“The Supreme Person [Bhagavān] said: My dear Arjuna, how have these impurities come upon you? They are not at all befitting a man who knows the progressive values of life. They do not lead to higher planets, but to infamy.” (Bg. 2.2)
Arjuna, the  kṣatriya , was refusing to fight despite being directly ordered by the Supreme Lord. He was thus chastised by the Lord as belonging to a non-Āryan family. Anyone who is advanced in the devotional service of the Lord certainly knows his duty. It does not matter whether this duty is violent or nonviolent. If it is sanctioned and ordered by the Supreme Lord, it must be performed. An Āryan performs his duty. It is not that the Āryans are unnecessarily inimical to living entities. The Āryans never maintained slaughterhouses, and they are never enemies of poor animals. The Pracetās underwent severe austerities for many, many years, even within the water. Accepting austerities and penances is the avowed business of those interested in advanced civilization.
The word  nirandhasām  means without food. Eating voraciously and unnecessarily is not the business of an Āryan. Rather, the eating process should be restricted as far as possible. When Āryans eat, they eat only prescribed eatables. Regarding this, the Lord says in  Bhagavad-gītā :
patraṁ puṣpaṁ phalaṁ toyaṁ 
  yo me bhaktyā prayacchati