The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1892-11-11
THE MODERN OPTIC.
Effects OF Civilization Upon tho
Human Eye.
Great Dangers to Mans Eyesight Brought
About by Living In Large TOWNSHIP.
creased Demands Upon the
Visual Power.

The last one hundred years have IN.
creased the need and capacity for work
upon small objects near at hand. One
OF the questions occurring TO the mind
is. do these different and increased de-
mands bring increased facility and ca
pacity TO the human eye? Eyes are now
used in ways never imagined by our re-
mote ancestors. possibly never dreamed
of in the oriental countrics. Whatever
there may have been In tho way Of
sculpture among the Greeks demanding
no typesottng. no electric telcgraphy.
no stenography and no typewriter. The
eye of the patriarch Job was consti-
tuted at birth and went through life to
old age very much such an optical IN.
strument as that Of tho English squire
who devotes himself to an outdoor life
In tho eighteenth or nincteeth century;
but Job had no printed books to be-
guile the tcdium and pain Of his seat in
tho sand and ashes The examination
of the mummies in the Egyptian mauso-
leum shows that there has been no
change in the anatomical conformation
of the human ear in four Thousand
years, and there is no evidence that
there has been any in that Of the hui
man eye: but the difficulty of preserv-
ing the eye for examination centuries
after it has ceased to see prevents us
from proving this. A writer in the Cos
mopolitan thinks It 10 safe to say that
it has not changed in any essential of
anatomical form during the time of the
human race upon the earth. But the
demands upon it and its occupations
are much moro exacting and very diff
fcrent from those that obtained among
the classic Greeks and Romans or the
patriarchal Arabians.
Tho tendency Of the people Of our civ
ilization TO live in large towns, in the
bad air and with the absence Of light
incidental to such life, may have
brought the human eye into many more
dangers than those that come to it in
rural occupation. Yet accidents to the
human eye in rural life are not at all
rare. It may be that civilization gen.
orally attains the loftiest plane in large
cities, where intellectual activity is
most intense. With this come increas-
ing demands upon tho visual power.
and often under improper conditions.
But II the nineteenth century civiliza-
ton Of great. towns has brought great
dangers 70 the sight. 1t has also
achieved great triumphs in the matter
of examining tho eye. 50 that we may
determine and increase it's power for
work and find out and cure its diseases.
1t Is perfectly possible. By means Of the
instruments of the nineteenth century,
to exactly learn the optical condition Of
an eye. to decide just what glasses. IL
any, are needed for it's perfect working;
and it is also possible to look in upon it,
and by the appearance Of its tissues and
Its blood vessels 70 decide a. - the ex-
istence Of serious disease, when there
are few other symptoms that point to it.
when there may be none besides to be
found in the body that positively prove
It.
There are two classes Of disease, one
constitutional and the other local. which
illustrate this latter statement: the eye
mirror opthalmoscope is the instru-
ment by which such things are settled
Bright's disease. name carrying dread
to many household. is the censtltu-
tional disease referred to. In not few
cases the diagnosis of it is made by the
examination of the rstiHa with the eve
mirror. The expert viii make no mis-
take if the eye gives evidence of 1t, for
its signs are positive. in minute bleed
ings from the blood vessels and peculiar
fawn-colored spots on the retina The
surgeon breads to find them, because
they are evidence Of an advanced stage
Of the Elaiady which prematurely de-
stroys 50 many lives Bright's disease
is. in fact.a degeneration OF many of the
tissues of the body. the walls Of the
arteries being among them In no part
II The body can this degeneration be so
resdily detected as in the retina of the
eye