Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1915-06-18
For Sunday Reading
AllSo,n of Opinion,
Defective Vision.

OeISCttVe vIStoH.
[Rev. II. D. Jenkins, D. D., in Sioux
City Journal
The light of the body is the eye. :
If thine eye be evil thy whole body
shall be full of darkness.-Matt. vi,
22-z3.
Walking rapidly along the city street,
we were suddenly arrested by sign
in the window OF an optician which
seemed to fling in ones face the de-
n:an6. TEST your eyes here" We
stopped and read it over three or four
times. Then, Of course, we resumed
our walk. saying mentally, What inn
pudence! What business has that man
suggesting that there is anything the
matter with our eyes?"
But reflection suggested perhaps"
The eye is a wonderful instrument and
specialists tell us that it is seldom per-
feet. That the manufacture OF glasses"
has achieved such proportion seems t
corroborate that finding. No organ is so
delicate, so complex, SO irreplaceable. A
light blow, a single grain OF sand, a
cinder flung out from a passing loco
motive, even a deficient circulation OF
the blood, may wholly destroy its USE
fulness. A fault in it's shape, q surface
too fiat or too convex, may seriously
impair its testimony. And IL the light
that is in one be darkness, how great
Is that darkness! No art, no device OF
man can replace the eye, even in part.
false hand or an artificial foot may
be made to perform some of the func-
ton of a lost member, but a glass eye
is only mockery.
One Of our railways had it's $4,000
employees examined by expert opticians
some years ago and more than 4 per
cent were found to be color blind. Not
only the engineer who has his gaze
fixed on the semaphore, but the sailor
interpreting the signal flags Of a pass
| ing steamer, the pharmacist selecting
a potion by it's color, and the nurse
who watches the flush and pallor of a
patient, all must have perfect vision.
A defect in the eye may cost a life
wreck a train or lose ship. The laws
| OF many modern states require that
men and women called upon to act in
| these and many other capacities shall
have their eyes examined-examined
not by the parties themselves. but by
a skilled and impartial specialist.
Every man assumes that his eyes are
all right. But we have only to look out
l
men measuring themselves by their
own standards easily deceive them
selves. The grandfather bitterly COM
plains that preachers do not speak a.
clearly as they did fifty years ago, and
the grandmother wonders why the
newspapers are now set in such small
type. The son Of our neighbor recently
was rejected as candidate for APP
pointment in the navy because he could
not here watch tick six inches from
his ear. An inferno In the hospital
lost his expected promotions BECAUSE he
failed in critical operation to discern
the signs OF danger in the filming pupil
of patients eye. Why not seek to
know whether the perceptions of the
J spiritual man are to be trusted or
need to be corrected by some infallible
test?
We recently have had legislative and
congressional commissions in session
seeking to get at the truth In regard to
our industrial unrest. How differently
men view the same facts. Something
surely 10 wrong with the eyes OF the
soul when what appears to one man
az reasonable combinations" appears
Ito another as crushing tyranny. That
which to one juryman ID murder most
four 10 noble act of self defense az
SEEN by another. The business trans
action which some great captain OF In
! asus..y nnds ebsolntely4 necessary to
control market does not look, when
exposed to the public gaze in the col
80