This was a very great miracle; and it shows us, too, how
perfectly the Lord knows and numbers all the works of his hands, and how
tenderly he cares for them all. This is one of the things that we are
apt to forget when have a beast, or a bird, or a fish, or an insect, in
our power. We are too ready to say to ourselves, "This is mine, and I
may do what I like to it." Not so; it is a creature of God's, not of
ours; and if we do to it any thing that he does not approve of, he will
surely reckon with us for it. When I call this to mind, I am
alarmed--though I do not think I have often been cruel to animals, or
any such thing--and I am ready to pray, "Lord, if I have hurt any of thy
creatures, pardon my past sin, for Jesus Christ's sake, I beseech thee;
and give me grace to be merciful for the future."

Now, having told you how I got instructed when I was little, I shall
give you the history of some animals and birds that I have had, and how
I treated them, and what amusement they gave me. I am sure if you knew
how very amusing they all are, when left to their own harmless ways, and
gently restrained from ways that are not harmless, you would think it a
great loss to have them so altered as they are by bad management. If I
had been a great traveller, I could tell you more wonderful stories; but
having only been in England, and Ireland, and part of North America, my
store of anecdotes is not so great. However, I will try my best to give
you some notion of what I do know; and as I shall often have occasion to
name Jack, I will begin by telling you who he was.

Jack was a little Irish boy, who became deaf while he was still a baby;
and because, as you know, babies learn to talk by hearing those around
them, Jack, not hearing anybody talk, could not learn, and so he grew up
dumb. It is a sad thing to be deaf and dumb. A person who is so, cannot
possibly learn any thing about God and our Lord Jesus Christ, until he
has been taught to read; and it is so very difficult to teach them, that
if some benevolent people, who have money, did not subscribe to keep up
charitable schools on purpose for the deaf and dumb poor, I do not
suppose that one in a thousand of them would ever learn so much as that
they have a soul to be saved or lost: and you may judge what a miserable
life they must lead, in total ignorance, nobody speaking to them, and
they not able to speak to anybody. Jack was in this state when I first
saw him, at eleven years o