46 EYE. 



lodged not in the contracting part, but in another 

 part at a distance from it, for whose benefit the pro- 

 vision is designed. 



B. It seems like one holding a screen which he 

 spreads or folds according to the wish of the person 

 whom he is protecting. No wonder it should be said, 

 the eye is a cure for atheism. We can suppose the 

 Almighty Creator could have enabled us to see with- 

 out all this machinery; — but then, observing the ma- 

 chinery makes us more sensible of an actual Architect 

 in our frame. Still there appears to be one difference 

 between the eye and a telescope. If we look with a 

 telescope or spying-glass at a far object, as a vessel 

 upon the ocean, and then turn it to a person standing 

 by us at a few feet distant, we find we are now un- 

 able to see : but it is not so with the eye. Our sight 

 is not affected by any moderate change of distance. 

 What can be the reason ? 



A. The reason is, and it is a new reason for ad- 

 miring the eye, that the spying-glass requires to be al- 

 tered, or fixed anew, before we can see a near object, 

 after looking at a distant one. Now this is done in 

 our eyes in an instant. In the spying-glass, we have 

 to pull out or thrust in a tube, so as to change the 

 distances of the glasses from one another, — or else 

 put in glasses of a different form. There is exactly 

 the same or a similar contrivance in the eye. It is 

 difficult to describe it, it is so exceedingly curious, 

 But the effect is to enable the eye to suit its glasses 

 immedialely to the different distances at which we 

 have occasion to look, 



