MAGNITUDES AND DISTANCES OF OBJECTS. 175 



one object to another ; and how much we are indebted 

 to examination by the touch, for our knowledge of their 

 forms, or how T much our judgment of their magnitudes 

 depend on comparisons, perhaps with our own persons, 

 we are unable to determine. These cases show, that we 

 are dependent for this kind of knowledge, in a great 

 measure on former experience. 



Chesselderfs Case. This was the case of a young 

 gentleman who was born blind, or lost his sight so early 

 and so entirely, that he had no remembrance of ever 

 having seen any object, whatever, until he was fourteen 

 years of age. His disease was a cataract in each eye, 

 and at this age it was couched, as the operation is called, 

 and by which, his sight was restored. 



" When he first saw," says Chesselden, " he was so 

 far from making any judgment about distances, that he 

 thought all objects whatever, touched his eyes, (as he 

 expressed it,) as what he felt did his skin, and thought no 

 objects so agreeable as those which were smooth and 

 regular, though he could form no judgment of their 

 shape, or guess what it was in any object that was plea- 

 sing to him. He knew not the shape of any thing, nor 

 any one thing from another, however different in shape 

 or magnitude ; but upon being told what things were, 

 whose forms he knew before, from feeling, he would 

 carefully observe, that he might know them again : but 

 having too many objects to learn at once, he forgot 

 many of them ; and (as he said,) at first, he learned to 

 know, and again forgot thousands of things in a day. At 

 first, he could bear but very little light ; and the things 

 he saw, he thought extremely large, but upon seeing 

 things larger, those first seen, he considered less, never 

 being able to imagine any lines beyond the bounds which 

 he saw ; the room he was in, he said, he knew to be but 

 a part of the house, yet he could not conceive that 

 the whole house could look larger." His cat, which of 

 course he knew perfectly well by feeling, he did not 

 know by sight, and being told what it was, closed his 

 eyes, to ascertain the truth in his usual manner. 



Mr. Wardrop's Case. A case in many respects, 



