happy to carry that flag from Petersburg to Kamschatka through the north-west passage.* * We know it is sometimes said that, after so many failures, the expenditure of so much money, and considering the risk of life to those engaged in it, the government would hardly be justified in making any further attempt. We shall briefly state why we demur to any such objections. First, with regard to the failures-we think they can scarcely be so deemed, as each successive attempt has been progressive, and thrown important additional light on the nature of arctic navigation. It has now been decidedly ascertained what route ought to be taken and what avoided. It is now known that, in the Polar Sea, open water is invariably found at a distance from land, whilst near the shores of the continents and of islands, and in the straits, ice is constantly accumulated and generally fixed to the ground. Hitherto it has been the practice to creep along the shore, and the result has been disastrous enough. Thus Parry, by clinging to the coast of Melville Island, had nearly lost the Griper among the ice, which forced her violently to the shore; and the Fury was totally lost by the drifting shore ice of Prince Regent's Inlet. Lower down in the same gulf, Ross was obliged to abandon his ship among the ice. Captain Lyon was in the same predicament close to Repulse Bay; and the last attempt of Captain Back, in the Terror, was foiled by that ship getting among the ice off the coast of Southampton Island, in the midst of which she was tossed and whirled about 150 miles in 200 days, and so damaged that she with difficulty reached Lough Swilly in a sinking state.† As a contrast to the disasters above mentioned, it will be found that most of the old navigators, Baffin, Bylot, Davis, Fox, Middleton, instead of keeping too near land,' carefully avoided the * A north-west passage would be of infinite importance to Russia as connected with her settlements on the N.W. coast of North America and the N.E. coast of Asia. Thus The latter route being less than one-third of the distance of that by Cape Horn. Boswell tells us that Dr. Johnson, talking of Phipps's voyage to the north pole, observed that it was conjectured that our former navigators have kept too near land, and so have found the sea frozen far north, because the land hinders the free motion of the tide; but, in the wide ocean, where the waves tumble at their own convenience, it is imagined that the frost does not take effect.' The premises as to 'too near land' are correct, but the conclusion is erroneous. shores, and kept in the mid-channel, where there was plenty of open water to allow of their moving freely, and none of them were caught and detained by the ice for a single winter. If the failure of Parry to reach the pole, after all his strenuous exertions, be considered as conclusive against the measure, we must demur on the ground just stated; he proceeded directly north from the north part of Spitzbergen, carrying as it were the shore-ice along with him; whereas, it is well known to the whale-fishers, that open water almost always prevails midway between Spitzbergen and Old Greenland, thus affording the best chance of success. If it be asked what the objects could have been of the attempt to reach the pole? our reply would be-various-curiosity the least of them; and we ask, would not the man, who had stood on the pivot of the axis round which the earth revolves, be hailed by all nations as the wonder of the world? Would not a series of scientific and physical observations made on that point be considered as of infinite importance to our present imperfect knowledge of that part of the globe? Then, as will be seen from the polar chartwhat may not have occurred to many-the shortened distance over the pole is most inviting; a direct northern course from the mouth of the Thames across the pole to Behring's Strait is only 3570 geographical miles, while the course from the same point through Lancaster Sound to the same strait is 4660 geographical miles-making a difference of 1090 miles, or nearly a fourth less, in favour of the passage over the pole. When Secondly with regard to the expense; we cannot imagine that, in a question of such importance, and with a navy such as ours, the expense of two small vessels, with the few officers and men required, ought to be a matter of any consideration with the government. Ten thousand pounds, or fifteen at the utmost, would go far to defray the whole expense for a year. we find that, for an expedition to the ice in the Southern Ocean, ordered by the Treasury (as mentioned in our last Number), for the advancement of the science of Terrestrial Magnetism, somewhere about 45,000l. appears to have been expended in fitting out two large bombs, and that about 35,000l. more will be expended in the three years of their estimated absence;— when we find, moreover, that above 60,000l. has been voted by parliament, at the suggestion of some very worthy people no doubt, to convert the negroes of the Niger to Christianity, and thereby, as has absurdly been promulgated by them, to put an end to the slave-trade-their location confined to one river and one point, on a coast of 3000 miles, full of negroes and rivers -we cannot bring ourselves to think that the trifling expense of of a few thousand pounds will be considered as any obstacle, by a reasonable government, to the completion of the passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Thirdly : nothing short of entire ignorance of facts could raise an objection on the ground of the risk of life. In the whole of the expeditions and their numerous winterings in the ice, not more than three lives were lost, and those appear to have been such as would have fallen anywhere; and it is a well-established fact, that the bodily health of both men and officers has been improved and their constitutions strengthened, by wintering on the ice. Captain James Ross, who, we believe, passed seven winters in the frozen regions, is one of the most active, vigorous, and portly men that can be seen; and Sir Edward Parry answers in person (and we have no doubt in other respects) to the vir liber' of Horace, totus teres atque rotundus.' But the degree of ignorance that prevails, even in the reading community of this country, respecting these northern voyages, is quite surprising. When intelligence arrived that two gentlemen of the Hudson's Bay Company had completed the survey of a portion of the North American coast, one heard in all societies, and read in a dozen newspapers, that the north-west passage had at last been discovered; and when Back was sent out to Repulse Bay to effect the remaining portion, we were told he was gone to the north pole. One is less surprised, therefore, at the simplicity of the gentleman, who, on viewing the panorama of Sir John Ross, said coolly to the showman, Pray, sir, be kind enough to show these ladies the north pole,' and received for answer, 'You see, sir, that there pole on the hill with a flag on it; that, sir, is the north pole ;' which sent him away quite satisfied. men of If the government, from want of information or from indifference, should be induced to abandon all further attempts to pursue a subject, which has engaged the attention of the first every age, from the time of Elizabeth to the present day, then indeed we may well despond. But no-after all the undaunted, persevering, and, we will add, successful efforts, that have been made and recorded, we can hardly persuade ourselves that this will be the case. We cannot believe-now the doors have been widely thrown open-that the triumph of first actually passing the threshold shall, after all that we have done to clear the way, be left to any foreign flag. Forbid it, we say, national honour! Forbid it, national pride! Should this be permitted, England may bow her head. ART. ART. V-1. Critical and Miscellaneous Essays. By Thomas Carlyle. 4 vols. 12mo. London, 1839. 2. The French Revolution, a History. 3 vols. 12mo. London, 1837. 3. Sartor Resartus. Ibid. 12mo. 1836. 4. Chartism. By Thomas Carlyle. London. Svo. THESE remarkable volumes contain many grave errors: they exhibit vagueness, and misconception, and apparently total ignorance in points of the utmost importance. They profess to be on subjects of ethics, philosophy, and religion, and yet, notwithstanding a plausible phraseology scattered here and there, they make no profession of a definite Christianity; and if it were fair to put hints and general sentiments together, and to charge the writer with the conclusions to which they probably will bring his readers, we should be compelled to describe them as a new profession of Pantheism. Yet there is so much truth in them, and so many evidences, not only of an inquiring and deep-thinking mind, but of a humble, trustful, and affectionate heart, that we have not the slightest inclination to speak of them otherwise than kindly. We are very willing to believe that what is false and bad belongs to the evil circumstances of the day-what is good and true to the author himself; and to hope that more light and knowledge will bring him right at last, since already he has advanced so far in defiance of the difficulties around him. In one point of view, Mr. Carlyle's writings, and the partial popularity which they have obtained, are a striking symptom of the state of the times. No author of any school confesses more distinctly that for more than a century the English mind has been incapable of originating or appreciating any deep philosophy. Its whole vision, he avows, seems to have been obscured, and perverted to a singular obliquity. The only works professing a graver philosophy, which we can now put into the hands of young students, who wish to know what their immediate ancestors have thought on the weightiest questions respecting man, are those to which the really powerful intellects of Germany and France have pointed, the better with contempt, and the worse with triumph, as the source of most of the follies which subsequently inundated those countries. From these a man may learn that he is made of five senses, and little more; that he is to think for himself, without listening to others; that he is not responsible to man, and consequently not to God, for his opinions, nor, therefore, for his actions; that his whole intellectual power is merely a machine for grinding logic; that it is his right and duty to govern himself, and not to be governed by others; that societies are joint-stock companies for taking care of of man's body, leaving his soul to take care of itself; that whatever he thinks and feels is right; that whatever he deems profitable is also good; that his mind may be anatomised and studied as a skeleton in a glass-case, and all its faculties and organs injected and laid out—and that with this, and this alone, we may thoroughly understand it; that it is every man's business to take care of himself; that it is our duty to see the whole of everything; that whatever we cannot see, and force into a syllogism, is false; that mystery is another word for falsehood; that religion is little more than priestcraft; that men can find, and did find it out, at the beginning, by the light of their own understanding; that if religion is to be maintained it should be excluded at least from the ordinary pursuits and speculations of life, and placed in quarantine, as if its very breath would infect the independence and value of truth; that prudent practice has no connexion with profound theory; and that in a world of railroads and steam-boats, printing-presses, and spinning-jennies, deep thinking is quite out of place. In this country the faint beginning of better things may be traced first in the works of Coleridge and Wordsworth. The former, a vigorous, self-formed, irregular, but penetrative mind, incapable of acquiescing in the meagre fare set before it by the popular literature, was compelled to seck for something more substantial in the new world of German metaphysics. How largely he was indebted to these for the views, and even words, which he promulgated in England, we need not now inquire. But whatever he may have borrowed, he was a man of true native genius; and Coleridge has undoubtedly given considerable impulse to thought in this country, and dissipated the ennui which the more energetic minds felt in travelling over the smooth uninteresting Macadamised road of modern English literature, where every mile brought back the same prospect, and the end was constantly in view, and not a turn or a chasm, or a rut was permitted to disturb the dulness of its logical perspicuity and ease. He put before them statements which they could not understand; hinted at mysteries; indulged in a strange uncouth phraseology, which awakened attention, as a new language; and first taught young minds their own weakness, and then encouraged them to undertake exercises which would create strength. We are very far from thinking Coleridge a safe or sound writer; but he has done good: he opened one eye of the sleeping intellect of this country-and the whole body is now beginning to show signs of animation. To Mr. Wordsworth the country owes a still greater debt of gratitude. Even he has only made a step to the restoration of |