Faraday, the distinguished chemist, says:
The change produced by respiration so injurious to us (for we
can not breathe the air twice over) is the very life and support
of plants and vegetables growing on the surface of the ground.
These latter absorb carbon--the leaves taking up the carbon of
the air to which we have given it in the form of carbonic acid,
and grow and prosper. Give them a fine air like ours, and they
could not live in it, but carbon and other matters make them
grow. All trees and plants get their carbon from the air, which
carries off what is bad for us and at the same time good for
them--disease to the one is health to the other. So we are made
dependents not only on our fellow creatures but on our fellow
existers as well, all nature being tied together by the law that
makes one part conduce to the good of another. (Text.)
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