Again, the time comes in the life of every one who is not near-sighted, and who lives to a good old age, when he cannot see near objects well without glasses. Between the ages of 40 and 50, the crystalline lenses of his eyes having hardened along with the other tissues of his body, he finds it impossible to focalize as he used to. He holds his book farther and farther away from his eyes, and finally he finds that he cannot read fine print at all, or without straining his eyes. Then he must accept the unpleasant fact that he is getting old-sighted, and if he wishes to use, and not abuse, his eyes, he must get glasses to take the place of his lost accommodation and with which he can read easily. Some persons who are near-sighted in one eye and far-sighted in the other never need glasses, but always do their reading and other near work with the near-sighted eye and their distant seeing with the far-sighted eye. I believe I read a long time ago, in an article by himself in the New York _Ledger_, that this was the case with the late Rev. Henry Ward Beecher. But the vast majority of persons who wear glasses, both for the distance and for the near, can see quite as well without them. They do not wear them in order to be able to see, but in order to have the strain removed from their eyes, and to be relieved from the many disagreeable symptoms, both direct and reflex, that result from eye strain. FOCALIZATION. The act of focalization is a muscular act and requires an effort, an output of nervous energy, just as much in proportion as any other muscular act, such as lifting a weight or shoving a saw or a jack plane. The eye that is normally shaped forms pictures of objects, more than a few feet distant, on its back wall without any muscular effort, and has to focalize only when engaged in near work. But the oversighted eye is compelled to do this extra work all the time, except when closed. If it did not focalize, it would see indistinctly. This it refuses to do, independently of any volition on the part of its owner. The eye that _can_ see distinctly _will_ see distinctly, no matter how great the strain, and this by a volition apparently entirely its own. The results are headache, vertigo, nausea, nervousness, irritability, and other disagreeable reflex conditions, besides the pain and inflammation, and other symptoms manifested in the eyes themselves. Of course, the only remedy in such cases is glasses, and these glasses should be carefully selected by a competent person, and should be worn as much of the time as is necessary to relieve the eye strain. I find in _Taggart's Times_, February 5, 1888, the following: "A French philosopher has said that a man who wears gold-bowed spectacles always admires himself, and it would seem as though spectacles were becoming a sort of badge of distinction, since young and old who have the slightest excuse for using them put them on. HEADACHE.