put them on their guard, without an instruction by which they can distinguish between truth and error, without an influence or a weapon of protection or defence.

The State provides for the religious instruction of the deaf and dumb. By what right or authority can it do this, and not be guilty of an intolerant oppression of the consciences of those who do not desire such instruction, if there be not the same right and authority to institute the teaching or reading of the Bible in the common schools? The Institution for the Deaf and Dumb is under the same general laws as the common schools, and the people's money is appropriated for its support; and if a religious bias, or the reading of the Bible, is a wrong to conscience in the public schools, so it is there. But who would dare lift up a voice against that institution of mercy, on the ground that it is sectarian, intolerant, and oppressive to the conscience? Yet it is but a public school; and in regard to all knowledge of the Word of God, many of the children in our streets, who have ears to hear, and tongues to aşk and to answer, are as destitute and vacant,

and as likely to continue so, if that knowledge be not communicated in the common schools, as if they were in reality both deaf and dumb. Nay, if they were so, and the Bible were excluded from the common schools, while it is admitted into the schools for the instruction of the deaf and dumb, then they they would be far more likely in their misfortune, and by the very means of it, to know the Word of God, and be saved, than if they possessed the common faculties of humanity.

Take now the simple and affecting description of the scenes at the last anniversary of this institution, and say if there was anything in the reported exercises of the pupils that could, even in our common schools, have justly offended any man's conscience. The President of the Institution declared that there is "scarcely a State in the Union of any considerable population and resources, that has not fully or in part acknowledged the claims of this interesting and unfortunate portion of its population to the means of intellectual and spiritual life." Intellectual and Spiritual; this is just. But if the deaf and dumb children

need the spiritual as well as intellectual, so do all other children thrown upon the State for their education; nay, more, in proportion to the more active part they will be called to take in the affairs of life and of the country. And if the State can, without violation of conscience and of right, give the Bible to deaf and dumb children in their schools, and ought so to do, (which who will deny ?) it can and ought, by the same rule, to all the children in the common schools; it would be cruelty and oppression to take it away from these, and favoritism to bestow it upon those. The visitors at this Institution were charmed with the proofs of success in developing the religious sentiment and conscience of the pupils, and delighted at the clearness, simplicity, and promptness of the replies that had been made to questions of a religious import.

"Who made the world?" was the question once proposed to a little boy in the Institution. Without an instant's delay the chalk had rapidly traced the answer:

"In the beginning God created the Heavens and the earth."

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Why did Jesus come into the world?" was the next question proposed. With a smile of gratitude the little fellow wrote in reply:

"This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners." The astonished visitor, desirous of testing the religious nature of the pupil to the utmost, ventured at length to ask, 'Why were you born deaf and dumb, when I can both hear and speak?" With the sweetest and most touching expression of meek resignation on the face of the boy, the rapid chalk replied :

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"Even so, Father, for it seemeth good in thy sight."

Now suppose that such a scene, at a public examination, and as the result of the reading of the Scriptures, had taken place in one of our common schools; who dare pretend or affirm that that would be an intrusion upon the rights of conscience, an oppression by the State, of those who reject the Scriptures, or an over-stepping of the proper sphere of government?

Argument from the Nature of an Oath.

THERE is another line of argument to prove unanswerably that the State not only may justly interfere to appoint religious instruction to be given in the common schools, but must do so, to be consistent with other statutes and appointments for the people. For example: The State appoints the formality of an oath to be taken on the Bible, for the swearing of witnesses, and on many other occasions; it is a very common administration by the State. Now, if this be anything serious, if it be not the gravest yet most absolute mockery, it is a religious reality of the highest and most solemn import and authority. But though a religious reality, still it is a mockery, if the State, having appointed this form of oath by law, and provided for its sacredness, do not