Over 20 years ago, right after I started building dogwood furniture, I got a fleck of dogwood bark in my eye. My wife tried cautiously to fish it out, without success. I suffered sorely for three days before I learned what to do.
Jack, a retired carpenter in his 90s at the time instructed his wife, Letha, to give me a flax seed. "Now pull your bottom eyelid out and drop that in there," He told me.
"You gotta be kidding ... that things bigger than what's in there!" My reply. He assured me it would attach itself to the thing in my eye and then just jump right out. That sounded absurd but at that point I was ready to try anything. I knew he was a trusted friend and would not lead me into something that would do more harm than good.
To my astonishment the flax seed roamed around in my eye and in a few seconds jumped out on my cheek with the tiny piece of dogwood bark on it. It was instant relief!
A few years ago after my mother died I was going through her belongings and found a BOTANICAL CATALOG from Indiana Botanic Gardens dated 1925. The description of using flax seed to remove foreign matter from the eye fit exactly my experience.
"FLAX: This seed was an essential household medicine in Grandmother's day, and many generations before. To remove bits of foreign bodies from the eye: Place a grain of Flaxseed under the lower lid, and close the lids. The seed becomes surrounded by a thick adherent mucilage, which entraps the foreign body, and soon carries it out from the angle of the eye."
I have used flax seed many times. I am always amazed at how it tracks down foreign matter in my eye, like a cold trailing 'coon dog and then jumps out of my eye onto my cheek!