Dr. Howe was an attendant upon the preaching of Theodore Parker, and was his intimate friend. In after years he was a member of the congregation of James Freeman Clarke at the Church of the Disciples. "After our return to America," says Mrs. Howe of the year 1844, "my husband went often to the Melodeon, where Parker preached until he took possession of the Music Hall. The interest which my husband showed in these services led me in time to attend them, and I remember as among the great opportunities of my life the years in which I listened to Theodore Parker."[15] [Sidenote: Care of the Insane.] Another among the many persons who came under the influence of Dr. Channing was Dorothea Dix, who, as a teacher of his children, lived for many months in his family and enjoyed his intimate friendship. Her biographer says: "She had drunk in with passionate faith Dr. Channing's fervid insistence on the presence in human nature, even under its most degraded types, of germs, at least, of endless spiritual development. But it was the characteristic of her own mind that it tended not to protracted speculation, but to immediate, embodied action."[16] Her work for the insane was the expression of the deep faith in humanity she had been taught by Channing. When she entered upon her humanitarian efforts, but few hospitals for the insane existed in the country. A notable exception was the McLean Asylum at Somerville, which had been built as the result of that same philanthropic spirit that had led the Unitarians to establish the many charities already mentioned in these pages. In March, 1841, Miss Dix visited the House of Correction in East Cambridge; and for the wretched condition of the inmates, she at once set to work to provide remedies. Then she visited the jails and alms-houses in many parts of the state, and presented a memorial to the legislature recounting what she had found and asking for reforms. She was met by bitter opposition; but such persons as Samuel G. Howe, Dr. Channing, Horace Mann, and John G. Palfrey came to her aid. The bill providing for relief to the insane came into the hands of a committee of which Dr. Howe was the chairman, and he energetically pushed it forward to enactment. Thus Miss Dix began her crusade against an enormous evil.