imagine an infinity of distance beyond it. And so of time, by extending any present duration to eternity; for no force of imagination would oppose such a barrier as would not raise the question in both cases-and why not go on? But infinity and eternity are thoughts which the most determined materialist would hardly claim for any organisation of matter!

I think one might proceed a step further, and, by instructing her to feel the pull between a magnet and its keeper, give through her muscular sense even a more perfect notion of power (which also might be extended to infinity) than Locke seems to have acquired; and if these could be annexed to her already well-formed notion of a moral Being, I do not see why the sublime conceptions of a Newton might not be engrafted on the mind of Laura: "Eternus est et infinitus, omnipotens, et omnisciens, id est durat ab æterno in æternum, et adest ab infinito in infinitum; omnia reget et cognoscit, quæ fiunt, aut fieri possunt. Non est æternitas, et infinitus, sed æternus, et infinitus, non est duratio et spa

tium, sed durat, et adest durat semper, et adest ubique, et existendo semper et ubique durationem, et spatium constituit. Deum summum necessario existere in confesso est, et eadem necessitate semper est et ubique."

If due attention be given to the education of the blind, useful hints may be gleaned for the education of others, whose organs of sense have no obstructing defects, and by availing ourselves of Sir Charles Bell's discoveries of the distribution and functions of the nerves subservient to the muscular sense, we may at least teach those more accurate adjustments of the organ of each sense, by which the apprehension of their objects is so much quickened in the blind. Accuracy of adjustment is equally necessary to those who would observe, think, or express. The vivos ducens de marmore vultus must handle his chisel for years before he can hope to rival a Canova, a Chantry, or a Westmacott:

Content with slow and timorous stroke to trace
The lingering line, and mould the tardy grace.

As my object in this inquiry was to ascertain, if possible, the mental state of the Blind and the Deaf, or, in other words, the disadvantages sustained by the obstructions of these avenues of communication with persons and things external to the body, it may not be deemed superfluous if I give a compressed recapitulation of what may be legitimately inferred from the facts here brought together.

1. That the intelligence is not in any thing like a direct ratio to the perfection of the organs of sense, and that the privations even of a Laura have not occasioned any proportional destitution of knowledge, enjoyment of life, or interest in the welfare of others.

"We think it would be hard to find a community of young persons, with whom time speeds along more lightly, or to whom he brings less sorrow and more joy, than a school for the blind.

"The visitor who approaches our house, nine-tenths of whose numerous inmates are groping in darkness, feels a melancholy presentiment that sights of suffering, and sounds

of sadness, must there await him; but when he has entered, he soon finds that he alone is sad, and that children who sit darkling at their books, or run fearlessly about at their play, are as contented and happy as those whom he left in the enjoyment of sun-light without." *

Dr. Saergent, of Dublin, told me, that he once found himself at table between two gentlemen, strangers both to himself and to each other. He found that one was deaf, the other blind. When, in the course of the dinner, their defects had become known to him and to each other, they severally deplored the loss which each of them knew the other to have sustained, but expressed no dissatisfaction at their own privations. So true is it, that

"The man that's robb'd not wanting what is stol❜n, Let him not know it, he's not robb'd at all.”

2. That the desire of knowledge and of personal consideration is even stronger in the

* Dr. Howe's Report of the Massachusetts Asylum for the Blind, for 1842,

F

deaf or the blind, since they cannot fail to suspect that they may not be justly appreciated, and they feel their need of the assistance and sympathy of others.

For though the fortune of their condition may have barred their way to distinction,

Yet still the self-depending soul,

Though last and least in FORTUNE's roll,
His proper sphere commands,

And knows what Nature's seal bestow'd,
And sees before the Throne of God

The rank in which he stands.

AKENSIDE.

3. From the difficulty of recalling their impressions, they are naturally more attentive to every passing intimation; and as memory is proportioned to the excitement of the occasion on which our thoughts are acquired, they are consequently more anxious than others to retain what it may have cost them much solicitude to acquire as men who have earned their fortunes are usually more careful than others who have attained them by inheritance.

Hence, too, I have observed that the infor