as well as their minds. Their works are not the
production of congested brains, for these were not oppressed with blood
belonging to other parts of the body. They studied and thought, and
exercised both body and mind in the open air, and thus observed the laws
of health. But among the multitudes of close students of the present
day, who complain of weakness of the eyes, the misfortune is generally
attributable to an almost total neglect of the first principles of
health.

While we reproach and loathe the man whose eyes are red and weeping with
the effects of intemperate drinking, we cordially pity purblind
students, as in some sense martyrs to the cause of learning. Dr.
Reynolds, a distinguished American oculist, administers a rebuke to such
which we fear is too often merited: "A closer examination of their
history presents a very different result. Our sympathy may grow cool if
we regard them with a physiologic eye. It is a love of the flesh, more
than a love of the spirit, that too often clouds their vision. It is too
much food, crowding with unnecessary blood the tender vessels of the
retina. It is too little exercise, allowing these accumulated fluids to
settle down into fatal congestion. It is positions wholly at variance
with the freedom of the circulation, and various other imprudences,
which are the results of carelessness or unjustifiable ignorance. 'The
day laborer may eat what he will, provided it is wholesome, and his eyes
will not suffer. But let the student, who is called upon to devote not
only his eyes, but his brain, to severe labor, live upon highly
nutritious food, and such as is difficult of digestion, and we shall
soon see how his vision will be impaired, through the vehement and
persevering determination of blood to the head, which such a course must
inevitably occasion.' So speaks Beer, whose extensive opportunities of
observation have perhaps never been exceeded. The daily practice of
every observing oculist is filled with coincident experience."

Among the prevalent habits of students by which the eyes are injured,
the same writer mentions the irritation produced by rubbing them on
awaking in the morning, a practice which has in some cases occasioned
permanent and incurable disease; reading while the body is in a
recumbent position; using the eyes too early after the system has been
affected with serious disease; exercising them too much in the
examination of minute objects; the popular plan of