434 OPHTHALMOLOGY 



A certain profound relation of vision and sexualism will some time 

 be established which as yet is unsuspected. 



Justly motived, therefore is the question : why has this great truth 

 been so long ignored, and why now do so many reject it? Some of the 

 answers are these : 



1. The progress of science has not yet reached the stage that will 

 enable certain minds to see its truth. 



2. The conditions of life and professional evolution have made 

 surgery of supreme importance. 



3. Organic diseases had first to be studied. 



4. The laws and status of infectious diseases had first to be made 

 definite. 



5. A mere habit of neglecting the eye and its all-important func- 

 tion and diseases has with some grown into a blind dogmatism. 



6. The theory of optics and the elaboration of mathematic formu- 

 las satisfied too many minds, and there was no proceeding to the 

 practical application in clinical work. 



7. Specialists in medicine, other than ophthalmologists, have 

 overstated the effects of the diseases of special organs. 



8. The ophthalmic tenotomist has made unwarranted claims, and 

 so made the profession blind and deaf to the* warranted claims of 

 the refractionist. 



9. The commercial medical journal plays to the galleries and 

 flatters the prejudices of its readers. 



10. Patent medicine venders, drug-sellers, and quackery within 

 the profession carry on the irrational tendency. 



11. Suffering and pain are positive, relief and cure negative. The 

 patient therefore is prone to forget the former misery, nor does the 

 physician recognize the cause of the cure by glasses, which is ascribed 

 to fate, gale repercutee, the doctor, his drugs, etc. 



12. The method of eliciting symptoms and of clinical note-taking 

 is so faulty that the very existence of the chief symptoms of eye-strain 

 is not recognized. The patient thinks the vomiting, the abdominal 

 symptoms, migraine, headache, dyspepsia, insomnia, loss of energy, 

 etc., have no possible connection with the eyes, does not allude to 

 them, and they are thus wholly ignored. Thousands of such cases 

 have been cured by glasses and the fact unsuspected by either 

 physician or patient. 



13. The desire for consultation practice, referred cases, professor- 

 ships, hospital positions, and "success" make the cunning silent, or 

 conservative. "Faddism" and "hobby-riding" charged to a budding 

 reputation are ruinous. 



14. Poor refraction work on the part of oculists is the greatest 

 cause of skepticism. Those who do accurate refraction know per- 

 fectly well that, broadly speaking, the ophthalmologists of the 



