1838.] Report of the N. Y. Deaf and Dumb Institution. 255

facts, documents, statistical, topographical, and biographical information concerning their respective parishes, and a body of materials will thus be formed, which will be of inestimable value to the future historian of the Church.

25.- Nineteenth Annual Report of the Directors of the New York Institution, for the Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb. New York: Mahlon Day. 1838.

Ir is not our object, at this time, to sketch the rise and progress of efforts in behalf of the Deaf and Dumb; the various methods which have been adopted by different individuals for communicating ideas to them, and the success which has attended these efforts. For information on these and other points of equal interest, we would refer the inquirer to the last four or five reports of the New York Institution for the Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb, where he will find the whole subject discussed in a very lucid and philosophical manner. Those who have been favored with an opportunity of perusing them, cannot but have been amply repaid their trouble, by the interesting developments therein made, not only as to the present actual condition of the deaf and dumb in this and other countries, but also as regards the history of those philanthropic efforts which have been made both in Europe and America, and which have resulted in such eminent success, in restoring to society that interesting yet unfortunate portion of our race,

The New York Institution for the Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb, was founded in the year 1817, a few months subsequent to the establishment of the Asylum at Hartford, which is the oldest in this country. Its progress was, at first, embarrassed by many difficulties, not necessary here to be named; but since its re-organization in 1830, and the accession of Mr. Peet, the present incumbent, to the office of principal, its progress has been as rapid as it has been successful; and we can now confidently say, without intending to institute any invidious comparisons, that it stands the first in this country, both in point of numbers, and in the reputation it enjoys abroad; and there are but two institutions in Europe* that can com pare with it in the former particular, while it is surpassed by none, either at home or abroad, in the number of its educated professors, With the principal are associated eight professors, and one deaf mute monitor, all devoting themselves to their work with a zeal and success, the substantial evidence of which may be seen in the *The Royal Institution at Paris, in 1836, contained one hundred and seventyfive pupils; and that at London, two hundred and thirty.

interesting collection of "original uncorrected compositions," appended to the last report. This report is a document of eightyfour pages, and is divided into three parts, viz.: The directors' report; the report of the superintendant of common schools, and the report of a board of visiters, appointed by the secretary of state -all made to the state legislature, from which the institution receive its chief support. We cannot do justice to all the particulars embraced in the report, in so brief a notice as this, however interesting they may be in themselves; and will barely state, in relation to the first two parts, that the institution is represented as being still in a very prosperous condition. The number of pupils, at the end of the year, was one hundred and fifty. The education is of three distinct kinds-the mechanical, the intellectual, and the moral and religious.

The school is divided into eight classes, each of which is occupied five hours daily, in the school room, under the immediate instruction of their respective teachers. The remainder of the day is devoted to recreation. In the evening, the pupils are employed in preparing lessons for the following day, or in attendance upon lectures on the various branches of natural science and history. Connected with this department, are a mineral cabinet, philosophical apparatus, and a well selected library.

The labors of each day are begun and closed with religious exercises, and a brief exposition of some text of scripture. Without any view to the inculcation of sectarian views, the great duties of personal and practical religion are explained and enforced. With the bible for their only text-book, and by frequent appeals to the moral sense, it is the constant endeavor of their instructors, to lead these unfortunate objects of their care in the path of virtue and religion. The board of visiters, after giving a particular account of their visit to the institution in December last, and presenting various specimens of original compositions, and extemporaneous replies to questions put to the pupils, conclude by saying, that the "visit was closed with an entire satisfaction on the part of the committee, that the New York Institution for the instruction of the Deaf and Dumb, is not only entitled to the continued favor and patronage of the state, but that it is one of the best seminaries of the kind in the world: the professors are all able and intellectual men; and its principal, Harvey P. Peet, Esq., not only an accomplished instructer, but one of the best executive officers with whom it has been the good fortune of the committee to become acquainted,"

26.-A Sermon, delivered before his Excellency Edward Everett, Governor, his Honor George Hull, Lieutenant Governor, the Honorable Council, and the Legislature of Massachusetts, on the Anniversary Election, January 3d, 1838. By RICHARD S. STORRS, D. D., Pastor of the First Church in Braintree. Boston: pp. 46.

Ir is greatly to the honor of Massachusetts, that its legislature has never renounced nor intermitted the practice of attending public worship, and hearing a sermon, on the day of "general election." This practice commenced in 1631; the senate and house of representatives choose the preacher alternately; and though the choice is made in the year preceding that in which the discourse is delivered, yet there never has been a failure, during more than two hundred years, from the death or sickness of the clergyman chosen. The prevalence of the small pox in Boston has, in a very few instances, prevented the delivery of the sermon.

The discourse now before us is an able and a seasonable one. It is written with power, and its doctrines are sound and conservative. The style is more diffuse than we like; but we seldom find so much strength and diffuseness united. The theme is, "Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers," &c.; and the doctrine deduced from it is, that obedience to government is a fundamental principle of christian duty. This principle is very clearly illustrated, and ably enforced, and the limitations of the powers of government are well stated.

Our readers will relish the following passage, taken from that part of the sermon which inculcates the providing for the diffusion of education, as one of the "duties pertaining to christian legislation :"

"If common schools demand the patronage of government, because of their powerful bearing on our great public interests, can our higher seminaries of learning be denied it? These are the living fountains that pour forth their fertilizing streams over the whole plain covered with the rising plants of genius, destined either to flourish or decay-to disappoint a thousand hopes, or bring forth fruit in rich luxuriance for the refreshment of future generations, according to the culture they receive. Shail they become "as a spring shut up, a fountain sealed," for want of legislative encouragement? If the Egyptian would irrigate his grounds, he not only prepares their surface, but digs his canals, and then watches the floating clouds as they are borne along toward the distant summits of Atlas, where they discharge their treasures, for the supply of the mighty river, whose waters convey fertility to the soil, with sustenance and gladness to its swarming population. And if the patriot would enrich the whole ground consecrated to liberty and religion, with common school instruction, let him not only prepare the surface of the wide field before him, and cut the channels through which the fertilizing streams may be conducted over it, but let him watch the sun-lit clouds of science as they float above him, and gather over the distant hills, thence to pour their treasures upon the vales below, through the channel of that mighty river which makes glad the city of our God. Our colleges form the Atlas of our intel

lectual world-and from them alone can flow the pure waters that are necessary to replenish our smaller streams, and fill our cisterns, and mature our harvests, and realize the patriots most ardent wishes. They are the fountains of public health of high moral influence- and of universal improvement. Their power upon public sentiment is gentle and penetrating as that of "the dew on the tender herb, and the showers upon the grass." So far from being the miserly hoarders of knowledge, they are its cheerful almoners, supplying the means of wealth, honor, and usefulness, not to a favored few, but to all without distinction who are willing to accept them. To them alone can we look with confidence for those supplies of extended and well-adapted instruction, which the necessities of the whole rising generation demand and in them alone is the power lodged, that can draw forth fully the resources of those young minds of special promise. whose developments under primary instruction evince their susceptibility of an enlargement and polish, which will render them the lights of the world."

We have room for no more quotations, though we should be glad to extract several passages, remarkable for their soundness of opinion on important topics, and the force with which they are expressed.

27-An Address delivered before the Members of the Norfolk Bar, at their request, Febuary 25, 1837. By JAMES RICHARDSON, their President. Boston: pp. 24.

THIS is an excellent performance, evidently from the pen of a sound and ripe scholar, and a member of the old school. The character and duties of his profession are regarded by him in their true light; and the spirit of the whole address is uncommonly pure and lofty. We always take a special and lively pleasure in commending such writings, both because we rejoice in every evidence of the prevalence of sound opinions in different quarters of the country, and because we would contribute to extend their influence.

28-Passages in Foreign Travel. By ISAAC APPLETON JEWETT. Boston: C. C. Little and James Brown, 1838. 2 vols. 12mo. pp. 319, 369.

A SCRUPULOUS regard to truth is one of the great characteristics of these volumes, and it is one of sufficient rarity in books of travels, to be esteemed of high value. Having followed in the footsteps of the author throughout a greater part of his route, within a few months of him, we are able to bear direct testimony to that point. This however is far from being their only merit; they are uncommonly sensible and well written, and mark the scholar and the man

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of taste, the accurate observer and the candid judge. Were the choice of topics a right of either reader or critic, we would express a wish, that our author had made a somewhat different selection of his, or a different estimate of the relative importance of those selected We would have had him devote a larger part of his work to England, a country to us in many respects of unequalled interest, which our tourist strangely undervalues; and if his prescribed limits did not allow this, we would have been willing for an exchange, and spared some four or five of the eleven chapters on the operas, theatres, markets, and eating houses of Paris, to make room for an equal additional number on the land of our fathers. Generous as he has been, his compliment to the Parisians will not satisfy them; they will consider it a great slight to be thought only of equal importance to the rest of Europe, and have no more than half of his pages. For our part, we think that he treats them with a full share of consideration, and puts a great deal more rose into the coloring of his picture of them than they deserve. He concedes to their city its claim of unequalled fascinations, and only slightly intimates that it is also one of unequalled abominations. As respects this latter point, the whole story is told in a few words, and all writers agree as to the tenor of those: they are in a deplorable state as to religion and morality; they are living without God in the world -he is not in all their thoughts. We state this fact not merely on the testimony of those whom it fills with anguish the impious Heine, who glories in it, laughs at the idea of calling the Parisians atheists; they do not think enough about God, he says, to deny his existence. Mr. Jewett gives us a truly appalling picture of the irreligion of the people in his chapter on a Parisian sabbath; and it must not be understood, that such an observance, or rather nonobservance of it, is inherent in the catholic faith-there are catholics in other countries, who yield to none in a spirit of true devotion on that day and on all other days; and then with what a suggestion does the chapter close-Paris unroofed! the thought is enough to make even a Parisian shudder- Michael Angelo's Last Judgment, and Dante's Inferno, are but feeble imaginings compared with the realities it would disclose. We cannot now enlarge upon this topic; it must be dismissed with the single remark, that we fall under a strange infatuation in systematically introducing our youth into "this largest sink of European vice," and teaching them when there to adopt the old maxim about being among the Romans, and the still more extraordinary one, that the traveller must see every thing, and follow to the end of every path, even those which "go down to the chambers of death." There is another notion, which comes by travelling abroad, that cannot be too loudly reprobated: that we must give up our narrow prejudices, our puritanic morals as they are are called, and adopt the more liberal standard of enlightened Europe. We rejoice to find Mr. Jewett expressing himself de