which we are on our guard against when sober, we commit, through ignorance, when drunk."

The article closes with St. Thomas's reply to those who seem to call for a hard-and-fast line defining the quantity of drink that may be taken without sin. Temperance, he says, moderates the use of food and drink according to their effect on the health. An amount of drink that would be wholesome, perhaps, for an invalid, would be excessive for a healthy man, and vice versa. An excessive dose of warm water might be taken medicinally as an emetic, and without sin, though it has in this case one of the effects of the excessive use of stronger drinks, which taken, even medicinally, in order to produce intoxication, are not allowed.

3o. In the next discussion, as to the relative gravity of the sin of drunkenness, St. Thomas, avoiding the exaggeration that has so often weakened modern temperance advocacy, states his opinion that drunkenness is not, of its own nature, the gravest of sins, since a direct outrage against God is graver than what is, directly, an outrage only against human nature. In the course of this short article the words of St. Ambrose are quoted:-" Non esset in homine servitus si non fuisset ebrietas." "There would be no slavery among men if there had been no drunkenness." What a host of thoughts, not all, perhaps, either logical or theological, fills the mind on reading those memorable words, "Non esset servitus si non fuisset ebrietas !"

4o In the fourth and last article the Angelic Doctor shows that while intoxication, in proportion as it is involuntary, excuses from sin arising from it, when it is voluntary increases the gravity of such sin as may be, or ought to be, foreseen as its likely consequence. The last words of the holy Doctor are words of mercy: Levius est ex infirmitate quam ex malitia peccare. May we not trust, without relaxing a single effort to check this sin of drunkenness, that it is, at least with our poor people, oftener a sin of weakness than a sin of malice?

ARTHUR RYAN.

THE DEAF AND DUMB.

ACKNOWLEDGING in the RECORD of last month a

communication with which we were favoured respecting the uninstructed or uneducated Deaf and Dumb, we referred our esteemed Correspondent to a Dissertation which appeared some few years ago under the title of "Claims of the uninstructed Deaf-mute to be admitted to the Sacraments," and which we promised to notice in our issue of this month. We now proceed to redeem our promise.

First of all we must say that, having carefully perused the Pamphlet, we could not fail to have observed the profound study it displays from end to end, as well as the Author's most earnest concern for the objects of his charitable sympathy. He prefaces his subject by claiming for them what no one can refuse, the largest extent of indulgence which the mildest principles of Theology can allow; and then laying down the principle, that the Sacraments produce their effects of themselves by reason of the intrinsic efficacy imparted to them by their Divine institution, requiring only on the part of the recipient that he put no obstacle in the way, he proceeds to observe, that the great embarrassment presented by an uninstructed Deaf-mute in approaching the Sacraments arises from the difficulty of ascertaining what may be his knowledge of the principal mysteries, and how he may be otherwise disposed. He accordingly opens out the inquiry which this difficulty demands, and beginning with the Sacrament of Penance, he asks the following questions on the part of the Confessor:—

First. How far can a Confessor presume upon an uninstructed Deaf-mute's possession of sufficient religious knowledge for the Sacrament of Penance?

Secondly. How far may the Confessor presume on his having contrition for his sins?

Thirdly. How far the poor Deaf-mute penitent, not being able to write, can yet make to a Priest who does not understand his signs, a confession sufficient for absolution?

Fourthly. How can the Confessor assign him a penance? The Dissertation takes up these questions in order, and beginning with the first it lays down the proposition, that

1 Browne & Nolan, Nassau-street, Dublin.

"a Deaf-mute brought up in a Christian family practising their religious duties, is to be presumed, after having come to the years of discretion, to possess an amount of religious knowledge absolutely sufficient for the Sacrament of Penance." This proposition the Author argues out at considerable length, his reasoning bringing to the surface the result of patient and deep reflection, as well as the closest observation; and it is more than interesting to see how he makes it appear, that the technical proofs which cost us so much difficulty to construct in the study of metaphysics to prove the existence of God, are found imbedded, at least substantially, in the human mind from the earliest development of our reasoning faculties. As a specimen of the reasoning he pursues, the following will, we think, prove both interesting and instructive:—

"With this supernatura! work going on within us concurred a natural agency, which we all feel in the midst of our interior, and the working of which goes farther back than we can recollect. It is that ever-busy, that never-to-be-satisfied curiosity which at every moment, upon every occasion, and in reference to everything, asks with devouring avidity the two questions. WHY' and WHENCE -questions which are at the bottom of all science and all discoveries in the religious order, as well as in the order of

nature.

6

"WHY?' We are always asking ourselves this question, from the very dawn of reason, and at every stage of life, and in every degree of intellectual development, and, in our endeavours to auswer it, we are solving problems as they come before our minds, and tracing out first principles. Directing our WHY' to the subject of religion, we exercised it in reference to the habits and practices of our parents and those around us. We saw them blessing themselves we saw them going on their knees-we saw their lips moving in prayer-we observed their supernatural expression of countenance; and all this asked with insatiable importunity the question WHY?' We saw them at other times put on a reverential countenance, use a solemn tone of voice, raise up their eyes, and perhaps their hands to Heaven, with various expressions, which we well observed had come from their hearts, and in noticing these things we felt our earnest inquirer within us asking WHY?' We saw them going to Mass on Sundays and other days, and frequenting the Sacraments; we looked about, and everything we saw put to us the ever-recurring question, WHY."

"We might extend the examples beyond limit, but enough to show how the ever active sense of curiosity has been working within our interior from our very childhood, and acquiring a knowledge of religion by seeking out answers to its ceaseless inquiries as to the

'WHY?' or the reason of all these religious acts that came under our constant observation, leading us step by step to know God, as the first Beginning and last End of all things.

"And are we to put the poor Deaf and Dumb aside, and say that he has no share in this curiosity, that he does not feel the question WHY?' knocking at the door of the rational soul which he has from his Creator? We are rather to come to the contrary conclusion, that centred so much more than others in himself, his curiosity is more busy and exacting, and his eyes doing the functions to a certain extent of the ears, he pursues his WHY' with greater earnestness, and therefore with greater success, as to everything that comes under his observation. He consequently, instead of being in a state of inferiority, has actually an advantage in his privations for the acquisition of the knowledge of God, and things appertaining to God, so far as such knowledge is derived from the source we are contemplating.

"WHENCE? This is the second question our curiosity perpetually asks. Looking at things beginning, progressing, and coming to an end, seeing things in motion and undergoing constant change, we feel an inextinguishable curiosity to get at the beginning, the origin and source, and we therefore unceasingly ask the question WIENCE?' We see generation succeeding generation in the animal and vegetable world-we see the water running in its course-we say there must have been some beginning, some source, some origin of all this, and we perpetually ask 'WHENCE?? This curiosity belongs to every age, and every stage of mental development, and it commences with the earliest dawn of reason.

"I read some time ago of rather an amusing instance of the exercise of this curiosity. A would-be unbeliever was spending an evening with a friend somewhere in France. There was an interesting child in the family who attracted the visitor's notice. He accordingly lavished his kindnesses upon her, and it so happened that an egg being within view, it was made the subject of their chit-chat conversation.

"Do you know,' asked the gentleman, 'how an egg is produced?"

"O yes,' replied the little respondent, it comes from a hen, does it not?

"Yes,' said he; and then proposing to have some amusement by puzzling her, he asked, and the hen herself, what does she come from?"

"The child replied at once, From an egg.'

"At this stage the conversation attracted the attention of the company, and the mamma, a good Christian mother, felt not a little uncomfortable to see her little one in such hands. He, however, seeing that he had all ears engaged, repeated his puzzle.

"Is it not very queer-an egg from a hen and a hen from an

egg

?'

"For the moment she was upset, and all was suspense, but the curiosity of WHENCE' must be satisfied, and after a little, with an animated naïveté exhibiting alike her innocence and intelligence, the child recovering herself said—

666

But, Sir, one of them must have been first; which? tell me.' "The unbelieving friend felt embarrassed in turn, but to keep up appearances he affected to laugh, as if enjoying the amusement of having puzzled the child. She, however, pressed the question, and all was attention as she asked again and again, Which was first, the egg or the hen?'

"He must answer, and says at length, The egg, my dear, the egg, of course, was first.'

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Whereupon, seizing his answer, she immediately followed it up by asking

"And then, the egg itself-how did it come there?'

"His unbelief would not, of course, give a divine origin to the egg, and trying to evade the difficulty and baffle the little inquirer, he said

666

"O, beg pardon, I should have said the hen-the hen first; yes, the hen was first, and then the egg.'

"The shuffle was too transparent, and urged on by the promptings of her curiosity to know WHENCE' as to the egg or the then, she said—

"But the hen herself, if she were first, how did she come there?'

"He is completely nonplussed, but to wriggle out of his embarrassment, he replied—

666

My dear, that is your own puzzle; I will leave you to yourself to answer it.'

"I think,' said the little one, the hen was first, and that IT WAS GOD THAT MADE HER.'

"The company could no longer restrain themselves, and there was a buoyant cheer and a hearty clap for the unconscious disputant, to the inexpressible confusion of the philosophic freethinker.

"Thus it is that the Divine words are often exemplified, Out of the mouth of infants and of sucklings Thou hast perfected praise, because of Thy enemies.' (Ps. viii. 3.) Thus it is that the indefatigable inquiry WHENCE' works its way, beginning with the first unfolding of our intelligence, and evolving unconsciously from the most tender years the philosophic argument ex entibus contingentibus,' which gave us so much trouble to put into technical form in our philosophical studies.

"And is not the Deaf-mute as curious as the hearing and speaking child? Rather more so, on account precisely of not hearing or speaking. He sees all that his brothers and sisters