si 
PREFACE. 
WHERE is ‘a disposition, not only in individuals, 
but in nations of men, to magnify all things 
relating to themselves beyond their just dimensions 
and proportions. ‘The Chinese, in their delineations 
of the world, were wont * to represent their own em- 
_ pire as one vast Square, occupying the greater part, by 
far, of the earth, and, all other nations as forming 
only insignificant specks, here and there, around it. 
The enlargement. of knowledge is accompanied by the 
enlargement of candour. It is|in the nature of science 
to quell: the extravagant suggestions of vanity and self- 
love, to embrace a wider and wider sphere of obser- 
_ vation,’ to view events in relations and consequences 
‘* A growing intercourse with other parts of the world, and particu- 
laly the late interferences, on the Chinese frontier, of the Russians, and 
our East-India Company, has begun, we presume, somewhat to abate 
this ridiculous prejudice. 
A more 
