Traite des Maladies de l'Oeil, et des Remedes propres pour leur Guerison; Enrichi de plusieurs experiences de physique.
Paris: De l'Imprimerie de la Ve d'Houry 1740. Later Printing. 12mo., pp. x + [1]-554; recent brown faux morocco cloth with heavily stamped gilt; bookplate of Joel S. Gordon; new endpapers and flyleaves; near fine as is. Later printing; first edition was 1707. Near Fine. Cloth. [19341]
The author here describes the "use of chemical fixitives, the onion-like structure of the lens and the fibrous fluid consistency of the vitreous." The Becker Catalog, citing Garrison-Morton 5824, states that since 1692, Maitre-Jan had "proved that the opaque lens is cataract, but before Brisseau's work appeared it had been regarded as a sort of skin or pellicle immediately inside the capsule of the lens."
Maitre-Jan (1650-1725), sometimes callled the "father of French ophthalmology," studied in Paris, but for most of his career practiced in his hometown of Mery-Seine. In the 1680s he observed that cataract "is not a membrane or humor that had formed behind the iris (as was then generally believed), but rather the opacification and hardening of the crystalline lens itself. He confirmed his observations in post-mortem examinations, publishing his findings in the first edition of this book.
Becker Catalog 244; see also Albert's Source Book of Ophthalmology, p. 213.
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