INTRODUCTION. 39 



tion at the expedition, in no very liberal manner ; 

 and had even made attempts, though in vain, to 

 induce the sailors who had volunteered for the voy- 

 age, to desist from their purpose. 



" With equal contempt we notice insinuations 

 of the inutility of the measure. A philosopher 

 should despise the narrow-minded notions enter- 

 tained by those who, viewing the subject as merely 

 one of profit and loss, are unable to form any other 

 notion of its inutility ; and just have sagacity 

 enough to discover, that, if a passage should be 

 found one year, it may happen to be closed the 

 next. AVe can well imagine that many such 

 sinister bodings were heard when Bartholomew 

 Diaz returned without doubling the Cape of Good 

 Hope, and when Magelhaens had effected a 

 southern passage into the Pacific. Briefly, then, 

 we shall not degrade the noblest and most disin- 

 terested enterprize that was undertaken in ancient 

 and modern times, by condescending to justify it 

 to the selfish and calculating horde, whose cavils 

 we have recorded ; but to the honourable and libe- 

 ral mind that thinks the pursuit of science worthy 

 of a great, a prosperous, and an enlightened nation 

 like England, we would say that the point in ques- 

 tion involves an infinity of results of the utmost 

 importance to the perfection of science j that tlie 

 benefits of science are not to be calculated, and 

 that no guess can be formed to what extent they 

 may be carried. Who could have imagined that 



