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4 leaves, [3]-176 pp, 1 leaf [errata]; 1 folding plate. The plate is attached to errata leaf. Contemporary boards. Title page partly detached, and partly adhering to front blank leaf. Foxed. Good First Edition, first issue. On the title page of the first issue [offered here], which was published by Fr. Vetterl, Purkyne is described as "Candidaten der Medicin". In the second issue, published by Johann Gottfried Calve, he is described as "Doctor der Medicin". Garrison-Morton 1492: "Purkyne's graduation dissertation on the subjective visual phenomena earned for him the appreciation of Goethe and the chair of physiology at Breslau. . . . There were two issues of the first edition published the same year." "In contrast to his contemporaries (mainly Goethe) who made similar observations, Purkyne was aware that the subjective sensory phenomena were neither exceptions to the otherwise clear laws of nature nor a matter of chance, but that they had a physiological basis, their determinism: 'The sensory organs are the finest indicators and analyzers for exploring the pertinent qualities and material relations making it possible to study the laws of the material world'. He postulated that to each subjective sensation there corresponds an objective physiological process in the relevant sensory organ, and that subjective phenomena, such as the visual errors or illusions, are an appropriate means of investigating the objective truth--that is, the physiological processes in the eye and its connections with the brain. PurkynE could not explain most of these observations, but his descriptions drew attention to them and stimulated further study" (D.S.B. 11: 214-15). Norman 1763 (Haskell Norman had the second issue). Albert et al., Source Book of Ophthalmology no. 1866. OCLC locates copies of the first issue in these US libraries: Bakken, Miami, National Library of Medicine, Oklahoma. (Copies of the second issue are at Harvard, Wisconsin). Seller Inventory # 16132
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