Critical reflections on several important practical points relative to the cataract : comprehending an account of a new and successful method of couching particular species of that disease / by Samuel Cooper.

  • Cooper, Samuel, 1780-1848.
Date:
1805
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Critical reflections on several important practical points relative to the cataract : comprehending an account of a new and successful method of couching particular species of that disease / by Samuel Cooper. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    moting its original introduction into prac- tice. If we look back to past times, and remember, that our ancestors practised Couching, when they were totally ignorant of the particular nature of the disease, which it was intended to relieve, our asto- nishment must rather be excited to find, that even partial success encouraged them to continue the performance of the ope- ration, than to learn that its issue was commonly unfortunate. Hippocrates and the ancient Greeks*, it is true, described the Cataract as a disease of the crystalline lens, under the name of Glaucoma; but no sooner had Galen promulgated the doctrine of the lens being the immediate organ of sight, than the correct opinion of the an- cient founder of medicine, began gradually to decline into oblivion, and, for many ages b 2 , after- * Sharp on the Operations. Ch. 28.