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And, while we would thus endeavor to prepare the Deaf and Dumb for a better world, we will not neglect the means of making them happy and useful in the present life. How many of their hours are now consumed by a torpid indolence, and vacuity of thought! How cheerless is their perpetual solitude! How are they shorn off from the fellowship of man! How ignorant are they of many of the common transactions of life! How unable are they to rank even with the most illiterate of their fellow men! How inaccessible to them are all the stores of knowledge and comfort which books contain! How great a burthen do they often prove to their parents and friends! How apt are they to be regarded by the passing glance of curiosity as little elevated above the idiot or the beast of the field!

We would soothe and cheer these lonely, forsaken and hapless beings. We would give them the enjoyment which active industry always affords. We would teach their judgment to distinguish, their imagination to pourtray, and their memory to retain, the various objects which the boundless stores of human and divine knowledge present to their view. We would make some of them capable of engaging in useful mechanical employments; others of holding respectable stations in private and public spheres of commercial transactions; and those who discover a genius and taste for such pursuits, of cultivating the fine arts; and all, of thus becoming valuable members of society; of contributing to the common stock of happiness; and of gaining a livelihood by their own personal exertions. We would introduce them to the delights of social intercourse; to a participation of the privileges of freemen; to the dignity of citizens of a flourishing and happy community: we would furnish them with one of the highest solaces of retirement, that which may be drawn from the fountains of Science and Literature; and books should supply them with a perpetual source of instruction and delight; gladdening many an hour of solitude which is now filled up only with indolence or anxiety. We would render them a comfort to their friends; and the prop of the declining years of those who have hitherto only bemoaned the sad continuance of their condition without any hope of relief. We would shield them against contumely; and almost render them no longer the objects even of condolence and pity. Thus they would soon have a common cause of gratitude with us, for all the temporal blessings which Providence sheds down upon this vale of tears.

And how would the feeble powers of him who thus attempts to plead before you the cause of the Deaf and Dumb, yield in efficacy to the sight of these children of suffering, could I but place them before your eyes. Then I would make no appeal to your sympathy. I would only afford it an opportunity of having full scope, by the interesting and affecting spectacle which would excite it. I would point you to the man of mature age; to the blooming youth; and to the tender child; all eager to gather a few sheaves from that abundant harvest of knowledge, with which a kinder Providence has blessed you. I would explain to you, if indeed Nature did not speak a language too forcible to need explanation, the lamentation of one bemoaning the long lapse of years which had rolled by him without furnishing one ray of knowledge or of hope with regard to his immortal destiny. I would bid you mark the intense and eager look of another, who was just catching the first rudiments of religious truth. And your tears should mingle with theirs who would be seen sympathising, in the fulness of a refined and susceptible imagination, with the anguish of the venerable patriarch about to sacrifice his son; or the grief of the tender Joseph sold by his unrelenting brethren; or the agonies of Him, who bled to redeem both you and them from sin, and sorrow, and suffering.

Yes, the Deaf and Dumb would plead their own cause best. But they cannot do it. Their lip is sealed in eternal silence. They are scattered in lonely solitude throughout our land. They have excited but little compassion; for uncomplaining sorrow, in our cold-hearted world, it apt to be neglected. Now, they seen some dawning of hope. They venture therefore to ask aid from those who extend their generous charities to other objects of compassion; and crave, that they may not be quite overlooked amid the noble exertions that are making, it is to be hoped in the spirit, and with the zeal, of the great Apostle of the Gentiles, to fulfil the animating prophecy; that "to whom he was not spoken of they shall see; and they that have not heard shall understand."

And can you wish, my brethren, for a sweeter recollection to refresh the slumbers of your nightly pillow, or the declining moments of a short and weary life; -- than to think, that you have succoured these children of misfortune, who look to you for the means of being delivered from a bondage more galling than that of the slave; from an ignorance more dreadful than that of the wild and untutored savage!! One tear of gratitude, glistening in the eye of these objects of your pity; one smile of thankfulness, illuminating their countenance, would be a rich recompense for all you should do for them. To think that you had contributed to rescue an intelligent, susceptible, and immortal mind, as it were, from non-existence; that you had imitated that Saviour who went about doing good; that you had solaced the aching bosom of parental love; that you had introduced a fellow-being to those enjoyments of society in which you so richly participate; to the charms of books which had cheered so many of your hours of solitude; and to the contemplation of those sublime and affecting truths of religion, which you profess to make the foundation of your dearest hopes, -- will not this be a more grateful theme of remembrance, than to look back upon the wasted delights amid which Pleasure has wantoned; the crumbling possessions for which Avarice has toiled, or the fading honours for which Ambition has struggled! These, fascinating as they may be to the eye of youthful hope; or bewildering as they do the dreams of our too sanguine imagination, soon pass away, like the brilliancy of the morning cloud, or the sparking of the early dew. The other will be as immortal as the mind; it will abide the scrutiny of conscience; it will endure the test of that day of awful retribution, when standing, as we all must, at the bar of our final Judge, He will greet, with the plaudit of his gracious benediction, those who have given even a cup of cold water, in His name, to the meanest of his disciples, to the least of these little ones, whom His mysterious providence has cast upon our care.