Historical label: “Eyes” in the 1850 edition’s “A List of the Principal Diseases”.
Modern literature has not yet been searched for this heading’s claims: it comes only from the 1850 index and has no search words yet.
A note on the heading
Plain sense
The eye in general: its inflammations, its redness and watering, its dimness. A catch-all heading: four of its five sentences belong to its two neighbours (inflammation and dimness), and one, Hawk-weed’s, is the eye in general.
What the entries treat
Five claims, all with a sentence; the bare heading beside “Eyes — (inflammations of)” and “Dimness of Sight”. Beets applied to the temples “stays inflammations of the eyes”; Eyebright “helps all infirmities of the eyes that cause dimness of sight”; Hawk-weed with women’s milk “for all the defects and diseases of the eyes”; Rattle Grass boiled with beans and honey, “drank or dropped into the eyes”, for “a cough, or dimness of sight”; Wild Clary’s distilled water “cleanses the eyes of redness, waterishness and heat”.
Today’s words
sore eyes; red eyes; watery eyes; conjunctivitis (for the red, watering ones); poor vision — a broad match: the heading covers more than this, or several modern things.
How it reads today
Not a condition; a body part. Two of the five sentences are inflammation (red, hot, watering eyes, which today usually means conjunctivitis), two are dimness of sight, and one (Hawk-weed) is the eye in general; inflammation and dimness each have their own heading in this book. A reader searching “eyes” should see all three headings.
ThinkDeep333, 2026-10-28 · draft, not yet checked. Offered beside Culpeper’s heading, never in its place; nothing here says whether a plant works.
Old claims, quoted verbatim: not medical advice. A warning sits above the claims and never hides them; no warning does not mean safe, only that no source here has flagged the plant.
5 claims: 5 with a sentence, 0 from the index alone
EyebrightEuphrasia officinalisCLM-0022961850 index, pp. 71, 396
The juice or distilled water of Eyebright, taken inwardly in white wine or broth, or dropped into the eyes for divers days together, helps all infirmities of the eyes that cause dimness of sight.
Rattle GrassRhinanthus minorCLM-0022991850 index, p. 150
The yellow Rattle, or Cock’s Comb, is held to be good for those that are troubled with a cough, or dimness of sight, if the herb, being boiled with beans, and some honey put thereto, be drank or dropped into the eyes.