benevolence gave no such advice, nor did He sanction such conduct by example. He to whom all hearts are open, and who, aware of the evils and hostility of vice and ambition, at once their object and their pardoner, He never but once refused time and attention to the profitless; and His only positive direct malediction was upon the unfruitful fig-tree that had outlived its time of usefulness, and which, under His frown, withered into a leafless and lifeless condition, that could experience no resuscitation. If we confess, as we must, that much of the evils which we deplore in the prisoner, is the result of adverse circumstances, then we must also admit that he may owe a future reform or repentance to some favorable circumstance, to that circumstance which the thoughtless and the infidel deem the providence of man’s fate, but which reason and religion declare to be the instrument of God’s care of his creatures. It is the duty of the philanthropist to provide for such a contingency, to have in the mind of the offender an appreciation of wrong and right, so that when unexpectedly the _circumstance_ occurs, there may be a knowledge of its capabilities and a readiness to improve it. In preparing this Report, reference was had to the fact, that some of the great objects of the Society have already been discussed in every light, and with masterly effect. Essays given in the publications of the Society, from men of distinguished talent, have been productive of great good in strengthening the confidence of active members, and in removing prejudices from the minds of those who lacked experience to correct false impressions. The great system of separate confinement has been presented to the public in a most convincing paper, by an able writer of this city, so that, for the present, it seems only necessary, in our Annual Report, to make a short reference to the system, and then to allow a statement of the proceedings of the Society to illustrate its effect. It is the object, then, in the _present_ Report, rather to make known the details of proceedings, than to announce the abstract views upon which action is founded; to give up this Annual Report to a presentation of the mode of procedure; to a detail of the daily duties of the active members and agents; to a consideration of some of the antagonistic circumstances that hinder our progress, and to the means upon which reliance must be placed in efforts to alleviate the miseries of prisons.