because a person born deaf, and consequently dumb, if he understood the signification of characters, called letters, and their composition, termed words: if he comprehended that such words were significant of such things, so that when the object was presented he could select the appropriate word, and alternately when he saw the word could point to the thing:—moreover, if he had learned to form these characters, he would possess a sufficient substitute for speech, and become capable of intelligible communication—as a correspondent he would be on a level with him who enjoyed the utmost fluency of speech. So bountiful has the author of nature been in the construction of the human frame, that when one avenue to knowledge has been impervious, it has been transmitted through the medium of another; sufficiently to constitute the person an intelligent being and a moral agent. It is the _capacity_ of acquirement to which we are to direct our investigations. If a scale were constructed, and a certain degree fixed as the point of competency, the circumstance of his not having arrived at such point, ought not to disqualify the person. It ought to be _determined_ that he is unable to acquire so much. It is true a man may be ignorant as far as certain acquirements, which we term learning, are concerned, and which form the basis of ordinary education; he may know nothing of what has passed in the world, which we denominate the history of our species; but he may be an attentive observer of the objects in nature, and know fully the purposes to which they are applied. Such a man, although ignorant, does not want the capacity to acquire, and therefore ought not to be disqualified. It has occurred to me in many instances, to be consulted concerning persons whose minds have been naturally weak, or enfeebled by disease; and it always appeared that by patient enquiry, a satisfactory estimate of their capacity might be instituted. It would extend far beyond the limits of the present work to detail the whole of the circumstances connected with this subject; but it may be briefly stated that the person exercising his judgment ought particularly to ascertain the power of his attention; as his knowledge of objects, and his memory of them, will depend on the duration of his attention; and it will be indispensably necessary to investigate his comprehension of numbers, without which the nature of property cannot be understood. If a person were capable of enumerating progressively to the number ten, and knew the force and value of the separate units, he would be fully competent to the management of property. If he could comprehend that twice two composed four, he could find no difficulty in understanding that twice, or twain ten, constituted twenty. This _numeration_ also presumes he comprehended that so many taken from ten, or substracted which is the converse, would leave so many as the remainder—without such capacity, no man,