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The sixth reason, concerning the importance of reading on the lips, offers little particularly objectionable, or worthy of remark, except the assertion, that "very few of those who have intercourse with the deaf and dumb have time, means, or inclination to hold written communication with them." However this may be in Germany, few educated deaf mutes in this country experience any serious difficulty on this score.

After making all due allowances, we are unable to see any thing particularly conclusive in the reasons we have examined ; and unless Mr. Mann has stronger in reserve, we hardly think he will succeed in persuading many of the American teachers of the deaf and dumb to tie the hands of their pupils, and compel them to articulate disagreeably, and read on the lips of those who will consent to sit or stand full in the light, and speak slowly and distinctly. To do so would be, in most cases, to restrict the pupil for years to the wearisome repetition of a few familiar and hackneyed phrases while, when left to converse with each other in their own language of pantomime, they are perpetually exchanging incidents, opinions, and imaginations drawn from a constantly enlarging circle of material, intellectual, and moral existences. Till we can give them a mode of representing words approaching in facility as well as rapidity to the speech of those who hear, we must either be content to see their ideas developed far more rapidly than their knowledge of words, or restrict them for years to extreme inactivity of mind and lamentable poverty of ideas.

Mr. Mann speaks of the object of "some of the Trustees of the Perkins Institution for the Blind" (in petitioning for a department for the deaf and dumb), "to exchange the limited language of signs for the universal language of words." If any of the Trustees of the Perkins Institution are in possession of a "universal language of words," we hope they will not long delay to communicate to the world so remarkable a discovery. We had imagined, that, since the confusion at Babel, such a language had ceased to exist, save in the dreams of philosophers. At least, though many of the signs used by the deaf and dumb are really universal, and many others nearly so, we are not aware, that a single word of any known language, whether said, sung, written, or printed, is universally intelligible among the inhabitants of this globe.

It is possible, however, that Mr. Mann has been as unsuccessful in expressing the views of the Trustees of the Perkins Institution as those of the German teachers of the deaf and dumb, and that the object to which he refers was simply to substitute, for the signs used by the deaf and dumb, the language of words most generally understood in this country. If so, we applaud that object. It is precisely the same for which all our present institutions have ever labored. Till the advocates of artificial articulation can discover some mode of enabling the deaf and dumb from birth to conceive words as sounds, the question between them and us, accurately considered, is narrowed down to the choice of an alphabet. We teach the common written alphabet; they would teach the labial and oral alphabet. Both are addressed to the eye, and both may be aided by sensations of the movements -- in the one case, of the fingers, in the other, of the lips, tongue, and larynx. We admit, that the latter alphabet, once well acquired, would be, under certain circumstances, much the most convenient; but we hold that its attainment is in all cases very difficult, in many cases doubtful, and in not a few impracticable. We prefer, therefore, to teach an alphabet which can be learned with ease, which is within the capacity of all, and which is in this country almost as universally intelligible as the other.

Some of the most distinguished teachers of the deaf and dumb in this country have expressed views favorable to the teaching of articulation and reading on the lips in certain cases. Such views are set forth strongly and ably, yet with proper restrictions, in the twenty-second report of the New York institution, to which the reader may refer. We fully subscribe to the position there laid down, that, when practicable, the deaf and dumb should be taught to articulate. Of course, the word "practicable" limits the application to those cases, few in number, in which the pupil gives promise of reaching a degree of proficiency that may fairly be considered an adequate compensation for the time and labor bestowed.

We admit, that all deaf mutes of ordinary capacity may learn to utter sounds which, to those accustomed to hear them, may indicate which of a limited number of ideas is intended but this mode of intercourse would, in many cases, be not only very disagreeable to strangers, but would, to them, be very often even less intelligible than the language of gestures. We also admit, that all may acquire the ability to read a few strongly marked words on the lips of their acquaintances. The latter, however, seldom fail to learn from the deaf mute as many of his own signs as are necessary for the ready expression of simple and familiar ideas; and these signs being far more distinct, visible at many times the distance, and with much less light, the deaf mute will use them in preference. It is by no means true, that those, who can read even very readily on the lips of their acquaintances, can read with any ease on the lips of strangers. We may add, that to read on the lips at all, beyond a few simple phrases and familiar words, demands a thorough skill in language, which many deaf mutes can never attain under any system of instruction. The characters of the labial alphabet are so indistinct and fugitive, that, in very many cases, the deaf mute, even of rare quickness of perception, can only determine the word used by its connection with other words; and hence, to use this instrument of communication readily, he must be perfectly familiar with all the ordinary forms of speech. The most remarkable instances of facility in reading on the lips have been those of persons who acquired a knowledge of language before becoming deaf.