Volume 1

Experiments upon vegetables, discovering their great power of purifying the common air in the sun-shine, and of injuring it ... at night. To which is joined, a new method of examining the ... salubrity of the atmosphere / [Jan Ingenhousz].

Jan Ingenhousz

Date:: 1779

Credit: Experiments upon vegetables, discovering their great power of purifying the common air in the sun-shine, and of injuring it ... at night. To which is joined, a new method of examining the ... salubrity of the atmosphere / [Jan Ingenhousz]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

20/402 page 14

$. [ 3dv ] out conftitution. The raoft active poifons which are known do not fo quickly deltroy the life of an anh xnal as the want of air, or the breathing of it when it is rendered highly noxious. It will appear in this work, that thofe very plants, which, influenced by the light of the fun, repair the injury done to this fluid by the breathing of ani¬ mals, and by many other caufes, may, in different circumftances, poi- fon fo much this very element, as to render it abfolutely unfit for re- fpiration, and, inftead of keeping up life, to extinguifh it in a moment. Therefore this univerfally-diffufed element deferves not only the pur- fuit of philofophers, but claims more immediately the attention of thofe whofe profeflion it is to preferve health and to cure difeales. I have \ bellowed$