PERSONALITY OF PLANTS 
man’s body. The plants always maintain an ad- 
mirable balance between the two. There are 
degenerates and unscrupulous individuals 
among them, but they never forget that their 
first duty is to themselves. Self-culture is with 
them a passion. Whoever heard of a plant over- 
eating or over-drinking or giving away to any 
of those indulgent vices which are the bane of 
the human world? They have their faults, but 
they are sources of strength rather than weak- 
ness. 
In relation to its companions of the vegetable 
realm, the Murderer Liana is a double-dyed 
villian, yet it is only practicing in an open and 
frank way, the food-getting methods, which all 
life, by its very nature, is forced to adopt. To 
live by the destruction of others is the sad lot 
of both the smallest plant and the most highly 
developed animal. 
Aside from the peculiarly human susceptibil- 
ity to self-indulgence, it is hard to find a single 
spiritual trait not exhibited by some member 
of the plant kingdom. 
Lover There is no higher devotion than that 
shown by the water plant called Vallisneria. 
[206] 
