96 A HISTORY OF 



from his fellow creatures. Indeed, when I consider the human race 

 as Nature has formed them, there is but very little of the habitab.e 

 globe that seems made for them. But when I consider them as ac- 

 cumulating the experience of ages, in commanding the earth, there is 

 nothing so great or so terrible. What a poor contemptible being is 

 the naked savage, standing on the beach of the ocean, and trembling 

 at its tumults ! How little capable is he of converting its terrors in- 

 to benefits ; or of saying, Behold an element made wholly for my en- 

 joyments ! He considers it as an angry deity, and pays it the homage 

 of submission. But it is very different when he has exercised his 

 mental powers ; when he has learned to find his own superiority, and 

 to make it subservient to his commands. It is then that his dignity 

 begins to appear, and that the true Deity is justly praised for having 

 been mindful of man ; for having given him the earth for his habita- 

 tion, and the sea for an inheritance. 



This power which man has obtained over the ocean, was at first en- 

 joyed in common ; and none pretended to a right in that element where 

 all seemed intruders. The sea, therefore, was open to all till the time 

 of the emperor Justinian. His successor Leo granted such as were in 

 possession of the shoj-e, the sole right of fishing before their respec- 

 tive territories. The Thracian Bosphorus was the first that was thus 

 appropriated ; and from that time it has been the struggle of most of 

 the powers of Europe to obtain an exclusive right in this element. 

 The republic of Venice claims the Adriatic. The Danes are in the 

 possession of the Baltic. But the English have a more extensive 

 claim to the empire of all the seas, encompassing the kingdoms of 

 England, Scotland, and Ireland ; and although these have been long 

 contested, yet they are now considered as their indisputable property. 

 Every one knows that the great power of the nation is exerted on 

 this element ; and that the instant England ceases to be superior upon 

 the ocean, its safety begins to be precarious. 



It is in some measure owing to our dependence upon the sea, and 

 to our commerce there, that we are so well acquainted with its extent 

 and figure. The bays, gulfs, currents, and shallows of the ocean, are 

 much better known and examined, than the provinces and kingdoms 

 of the earth itself. The hopes of acquiring wealth by commerce, has 

 carried man to much greater length than the desire of gaining infor 

 mation could have done. In consequence of this, there is scarce a 

 strait or a harbour, scarce a rock or a quicksand, scarce an inflectiun 

 of the shore, or the jutting of a promontory, that has not been minute- 

 ly described. But as these present very little entertainment to the 

 imagination, or delight to any but those whose pursuits are lucrative, 

 they need not be dwelt upon here. While the merchant and the mari 

 ner are solicitous in describing currents and soundings, the naturalist 

 is employed in observing wonders, though not so beneficial, yet to him 

 of a much more important nature. The saltness of the sea seems to 

 be the foremost. 



Whence the sea has. derived that peculiar bitterish saltness which 

 we find in it, appears, by Aristotle, to have exercised the curiosity of 

 naturalists in all ages. He supposed (and mankind were for ages con 

 ml \vilh the solut'on') tnat the sun continually raised dry saline ex 



