17. Presbyopy is principally caused by too little convexity of the cornea and crystalline lens, which throws the focal point of rays reflected from near objects, beyond the retina. This defect is experienced by most people, to a greater or less degree, after they have advanced beyond the fortieth year, and occasionally even by youth. A remedy, or, at least, a palliation, is found in the use of convex glasses, which render the rays more convergent, and enable the eye to refract them to a focus farther forward, at the proper point.
18. The opticians have their spectacles numbered, to suit different periods of life; but, as the short-sighted and long-sighted conditions exist in a thousand different degrees, each person should select for himself such as will enable him to read without effort at the usual distance.
19. The great obstacle to viewing small objects at the usual distance, arises from too great a divergence of the light reflected from them, which causes the rays to reach the retina before they have converged to a focus. This defect is remedied by convex lenses, which bring the visual point nearer to the eye, and consequently cause the rays to concentrate in a large focus upon the retina. The most powerful microscopic lenses are small globules of glass, which permit the eye to be brought very near to the object.
20. Microscopes are either single or double. In the former case, but one lens is used, and through this the object is viewed directly; but, in the latter case, two or more glasses are employed, through one of which a magnified image is thrown upon a reflecting surface, and this is viewed through the other glass, or glasses, as the real object is seen through a single microscope.
21. The solar microscope, on account of its great magnifying powers, is the most wonderful instrument of this kind. The principles of its construction are the same with those of the camera obscura. The difference consists chiefly in the minor circumstance of placing the object very near the lens, by which a magnified image is thrown at the focal point within the room.
22. In the case of the camera obscura, the objects are at a far greater distance from the glass on the outside than the images, at the focal point, on the inside. The comparatively great distance of the object, in this case, causes the image to be proportionably smaller. In the solar microscope, a small mirror is used to receive the rays, and to reflect them directly upon the object.
23. The magic lantern is an instrument used for magnifying paintings on glass, and for throwing their images upon a white surface in a darkened room. Its general construction is the same with that of the solar microscope; but, in the application, the light of a lamp is employed instead of that from the sun.
24. Telescopes are employed for viewing objects which from their distances appear small, or are invisible to the naked eye. They are of two kinds, refracting and reflecting. The former kind is a compound of the camera obscura and the single microscope. It consists of a tube, having at the further end a double convex lens, which concentrates the rays at a focal point within, where the image is viewed through a microscopic lens, placed at the other end.
25. In the construction of reflecting telescopes, concave mirrors, or specula, are combined with a double convex lens. A large mirror of this kind is so placed in the tube, that it receives the rays of light from objects, and reflects them upon another of a smaller size. From this they are thrown to a focal point, where the image is viewed through a double convex lens. The specula are made of speculum metal, which is a composition of certain proportions of copper and tin.
26. Many optical appearances are of such frequent recurrence, that they could not have escaped the earliest observers; nevertheless, ages appear to have elapsed, before any progress was made towards an explanation of them. Empedocles, a Greek philosopher, born at Agrigentum in Sicily, 460 years before Christ, is the first person on record who attempted to write systematically on light.