EPEE, CHARLES-M1CHEL DE L'. This distinguished friend and instructor of the deaf and dumb was born at Versailles, in November 1712. His father, a man of talent and probity, was the king's architect Yonug rEpde was educated for the church, a pro fession for which his mild, cheerful, and pious disposition peculiarly fitted him. There were difficulties at first. in the way of his admission to the priesthood. He was required, according to the established practice of the diocese of Paris, to sign a formulary of faith ; and this being opposed to his own opinions (which were Jansenist), he could not do so conscientiously. He was however admitted to the rank of deacon, but was told never to pretend to holy orders. He was then led to engage in the study of the law, but this profession did not suit the bias of his mind. At last. be succeeded in obtaining holy orders, being ordained by the Bishop of Troyes, a nephew of Bossuet, and received from him a canonry in the cathedral of Troyes.
An accidental circumstance led him to devote himself to the instruction of the deaf and dumb. Business took him one day to a house where he found only two young women, who were busily en gaged iu needlework, but who paid no attention to his questions. The mother of the young women arriving shortly afterwards, explained to him with tears that they were deaf and dumb. An ecclesiastic named Vanin had commenced the education of these young persons by means of pictures; but death had removed him, and no other person had offered to instruct the mutes. " Believing," says M. de 1'Ep6e, "that these two children would live and die in ignorance of their religion, if I did not attempt some means of instructing them, I was touched with compassion, and told the mother that she might send them daily to my house, and that I would do whatever I might find possible for them." John Paul Bonet's book came in the way of M. de l'Ep6e ; a person offered a copy of it to him, urging him to buy it, which ho at first refused, not knowing the nature of the work, and alleging that he did not understand Spanish, and that the book was therefore of no use to him. Opening it casually, he found the copperplate engraving of
Bonet's one-handed alphabet. Tho book was immediately bought, and De rEp6e learned Spanish to enable him to read it. De 1'Ep6e was persevering and disinterested in his instruction of the deaf and dumb. He persevered until he converted opposition and contempt into approbation, eventually enlisting the public in favour of his teaching to a much greater extent than any of his predecessors in the work of instructing the deaf and dumbhad done. De rEpte employed the finger alphabet only partially in his method, his dependence being placed chiefly on methodical signs and writing for the conveyance of Ideas; but he failed to see that in teaching signs he was not teaching ideas. He professed to teach the meaning with the signs and words, but the end would have been accomplished more simply by using the words only. Yet; though the methods of the Abb6 de 1'Ep6e were incomplete and somewhat cumbrous, there can be no reasonable doubt. that he employed them because they were the best with which he was acquainted, or of which he was able to obtain information; and he devoted his life and his means with entire single-mindedness to the promotion of the moral and intellectual elevation of the unfortunate clans whose cause he had espoused. His income was about 4001., of which he allowed about 100/. for his own expenses, and appropriated the remainder to the support and instruction of indigent mutes. "The rich," he said, "only come to my house by tolerance ; it is not to them that I devote myself—it is to the poor; but for them, I should never have undertaken the education of the deaf and dumb." M. de rEpde died December 23, 1789, aged seventy-seven. His memory received various honours: his funeral oration was pronounced by the Abb6 Fauchet, the king's preacher. He ranks deservedly among those whose lives have been devoted to the amelioration of the condition of their fellow-men, and the fruits of whose labours do not die with them.