But, independently of specious rogues, it is high time the fact was recognized that a feeling does largely exist among prisoners and ex-prisoners that the fact of having been in prison is a sure passport to public sympathy, and constitutes a claim upon public assistance. A large proportion of prisoners are, of course, people of low intelligence, who cannot estimate things at a proper value or see things as ordinary-minded people see them, and to these the belief becomes a certainty and the hope almost a realization. Let me repeat, then, that the duty of the community to help and "rescue" discharged prisoners has been so insistently and persistently proclaimed that prisoners now quite believe it, and are eagerly ready to leave to societies, organizations, or individuals other than themselves those efforts that are undoubtedly necessary for their own reformation and re-establishment. I hold, and very strongly hold, that there is no hope of any prisoner's reformation who has no sorrow for the wrong he has done, and no sense of shame for the disgrace he has brought upon himself and others. I am not sure which is the more hopeless and repulsive kind of an individual--the man who blatantly demands assistance because he has been a rogue, or the fawning hypocrite who professes repentance, tells of his conversion, and thanks God that he has been in prison; but I do know that both have the same object in view, and that both are but specimens of a numerous class. While giving a course of lectures in our large prisons I had opportunities of becoming acquainted with many of the prisoners. At the conclusion of each lecture those prisoners who had expressed during the week a wish to consult me were allowed to do so in strict privacy. I had some very interesting talks with them. For many of them I felt profoundly sorry, and made some arrangement to meet with them when they were once more at liberty. For others I felt no pity, for I realized that they were barely receiving a just reward for their deeds.