From slighter troubles, through all the more serious and dangerous states arising from injury or produced by spontaneous or specifically aroused inflammation, to the wonderful operations devised to give sight, when the clear and beautiful lens has become clouded, or the delicate muscular meshes of the iris are bound down or drawn together so as to close the pupil and shut out the visible world, the learned and skilful operator comes to our aid, a veritable messenger of mercy.  To be deprived of sight,—­who can fully appreciate this melancholy condition, save those who have been in danger of such a fate, or have had actual experience of it, though only temporarily?  Such a misfortune is universally allowed to be worse, by far, than congenital blindness.  And this is not difficult to understand.  The eyes that have been permitted to drink in the varied hues of the landscape, and to gaze with such delight upon the celestial revelations spread out nightly above and around them, are indeed in double darkness when all this power and privilege are swept away, it may be forever.  The astronomer can truly estimate the value of healthy eyes.

In looking over again, after a thorough perusal some time since, the admirable work which forms the theme of this notice, we could not resist the impulse to call attention to the infinite uses, unbounded importance, and inestimable value of the organs of vision; and we have no fear but our postulate in regard to the manner in which we should all prize their conservators will be heartily acceded to.

This is hardly the place in which to enter into a minute professional examination of this new volume.  If we advert generally to its purpose, and point out the undoubted benefits its recommendations and teaching are destined to confer, both upon those who are sufferers,—­or who will be, unless they heed its warnings,—­and upon the practitioners who devote either an exclusive or a general attention to the diseases of the eye, the end we have in view will be partially attained,—­and fully so, if the author’s convincing instructions are brought into that universal adoption which they not only eminently deserve, but must command.  Let us hope that the clear style, sensible advice, and valuable information, derived from so varied an experience as that which has been enjoyed by our author, will have a wide and growing influence in the extensive field of professional ministrations demanded by this class of cases,—­for, let it be remembered, and reverently be it written, “THE LIGHT OF THE BODY IS THE EYE.”

The distinctive aim of the author—­and which is kept constantly in view—­is the simplifying both of the classification and the treatment of the diseases of the eye.  We know of no volume which could more appropriately and beneficially be put into the hands of the medical student, nor any which could meet a more appreciative welcome from the busy practitioner.  The former cannot, at the tender age of his professional life, digest the ponderous masses of ocular lore which adorn the shelves of the maturer student’s library; and the latter, while he is glad to have these elaborate works at his command for reference, is refreshed by a perusal of a few pages of the more unpretending, but not less valuable vade-mecum.