knew his alphabet, and learned to spell, he could tell the names of all the persons he was in the habit of seeing as he grew up he learned to write, and afterwards to draw, and he became in time a very eminent painter. Yet this mute had never been the inmate of an asylum; indeed, it is but prejudice which prevents parents sending deaf and dumb children to school, because during early infancy much is learnt from imitation and the company of other children.

It is an error to suppose that all the deaf and dumb are incurable; deafness is often owing to a material obstacle interposed between the auditive nerve and the external sounds, as sight is prevented by the existence of the cataract; in both cases it suffices to remove the obstacle. M. Deleau has written a most interesting work, shewing in what manner he taught the deaf and dumb, on whom he had performed an operation, to hear and communicate. Among some of these patients were examples of the auditive organs opened suddenly to noise and sounds. The first sensations of an unpractised ear, are to receive sounds, distinguish the place from which they come; gradually the sense of hearing improves, and the slightest sounds may be heard.

What we have said of the blind and dumb-of these incomplete and deformed beings, suffices to shew, that in the education of children, while all the senses are not paralyzed, we may, by means of the normal senses, make up for those that are

wanting, and, by different means reach the brain ; and, as there are different degrees of idiotcy, the study we have made of the education of the blind, and deaf and dumb, will serve as a transition to treat of the education that may be given to some idiots.

If it be said, that we leave physical education, to treat of intellectual education, it will be easy to shew that we do not depart from our original subject, when there is question of giving supplementary senses-sight, hearing, and speech, to those who are unhappily deprived of them. The following chapter will show how far we may hope to make up for the deficiencies resulting from the anomalies of the brain.

BOOK THE FOURTH.

CHAP. I.

Physical Education of the Cerebral Organs.

A GOOD education tends to the perfection of man, and to the full development of all his faculties. It is not muscular strength alone, nor the intellectual faculties exclusively that are to be developed, it is the whole human being. First, the body, as the principal and indispensable foundation of the human edifice; then the heart, which embraces the affections; the mind, which comprize all the operations of thought; let the body alone be developed, and we shall have but savages, and their brutal instinct; let the affective faculties alone be developed, and we shall have fearful inclinations to suppress-we shall have madmen and criminals; develop the mind only, and we may, perchance, produce some geniuses, but more certainly hypochondriacs, misanthropists, maniacs; and we shall, perhaps, agree with the philosopher who said, "that the most civilized men, the most elevated minds are but depraved animals."

"Physical and mental education," therefore, as Montaigne very justly observed, "must not be separated." In the present age we must depart from the exclusive education of Sparta, as well as from that of those moderns who only see that there is an intelligence to cultivate. As in the creation, God did not despise matter, and that it pleased Him to unite for a time, the soul to the body, it does not behove us to separate it. Can we possibly disunite the body and mind of man,―separate his intellectual faculties from his natural organization? Is man but mind, is he but matter?

God having united the mind to the body by mysterious links, has not, however, made them independent of each other. The mind is not free when the body is in pain; the body in its turn suffers; all the organic functions languish when the mind is affected by any moral cause; united like the Siamese twins, all feelings are common to each.

"The physical constitution," says Condorcet, "seems to influence the human intelligence, not as having the power of modifying it, but as opposing obstacles to its activity, or as giving strength to employ it with more constancy and liberty."

What this philosopher foresaw of the influence of physical organization on the human intelligence, has received greater development, and the mens sana in corpore sano, has partly found its confirmation in the works of Gall.

We have in the preceding books, given the study of the development of the human body during the first stage of life; we have considered it both in its regular and irregular growth. We have shewn that the alteration in shape, the degree of strength or weakness, caused continual disturbance in the different functions of the economy. There yet remains for us to study one part of the body, which is the brain-organ of thought and feeling,-of the affective and intellectual faculties.

Is it requisite that the shape of the brain be regular, in order to exercise its functions? Must there be equilibrium in its faculties, as there must be equilibrium in supporting the body, either seated or walking? Undoubtedly. The harmony of the functions is destroyed if our propensities be stronger than our intellectual faculties; this harmony is also destroyed if our intellectual faculties be stronger than our propensities. But how far can the brain, apparently unequally developed, fill its functions normally? Then again, when the cerebral apparatus has regularity of shape and development, are its functions in a state of equilibrium, which nothing can destroy? Certainly not. Consequently there is nothing absolute in the study we are about to make.

Between the highest and lowest intellectual scale,-between normal and vegetative activity, there are numerous intermediate degrees. The brain undoubtedly rules over all other organs, and