Alexandria gazette & daily advertiser. [volume] (Alexandria [Va.]) 1817-1822, 1818-08-13

How many goodly creatures are there here!
How beauteous mankind is! o brave new
world,
That have such people int
SHAKESPEARE.
Were the civilized world 10 open their
accounts, in way Of debtor and creditor,
with each particular nation, from the first
trace of civilization in history up to the pre-
sent time, on the score of the various be-
nefts which each has contributed TO the
great general amount of the comforts and
accommodation Of society-whether oil or
nament or Of substantial value-whether Of
mental or physical good-or whether spe-
| culative or practical, it can scarcely be
| doubted that the balance would be de-
cidedly IN favor of Great Britain. The
works of her philosophers are the main
guides of the world, in the walks OF SCI
ence and the productions of her artists
| and manufacturers furnish a large share OF
the commerce of all nations. From her ex-
ample and instruction, The modern world
has derived those intrepid and generous
principles of freedom which, improved up
on by America, are rapidly spreading over
the civilized nations Of the earth, and will,
it may reasonably be hoped, ere many years
be past, illuminate, not the minds only, but
the bosoms too, of all the more intelligent
sections of the human race; while her opu-
lence, humanity and enterprise have from
time to time brought 10 light, from the OBJ
security Of barbarism, nations Of people, be-
fore not imagined to exist, and transferred
them from the condition of savages TO the
exaltation of civilized, and in some cases,
Of refined social life. To these she has
lately added the discovery Of Loo-Choo
islands, though her claims on that score
cannot be rated so very high in all these
respects we have enumerated; for, though
Ito borrow the language Of the Edinburgh
Revewer) the discovery Of those islands
ought TO make Britons "proud Of their
country" and TO put every man "m good
humor 7Vih his species" the redemption OF
the people who inhabit them from barba-
rism, is not to be reckoned among the tri
umphs furnished by this event, since the
inhabitants of these new discovered regions
never were found as others were, labouring
under the disadvantages Of savage life
Though altogether unknown and undreamt
of by any of the people Of Europe or A.
merica--even by the most active and en-
terprising maritime nations of the earth
they possess great skill in useful and or
namental arts and manufactures and if the
value Of their laws and moral institutions
may be estimated by their happy effects
upon their own lives, customs, dispositions
and conduct, they must have some code of
their own, Of great excellence, under the
influence of which their moral habitudes,
manners and social practices are shaped to
degree Of perfection which those on the
opposite side OF the globe have for many
ages in vain endeavored TO secure by the
strictest injunctions Of religion, and all the
seventies Of sanguinary criminal laws.
In one respect particularly, the discove-
ries now under consideration most essen
tally and pleasingly differ from all that
have hitherto been related. In former
voyages and discoveries, the interest de-
rived from the novelty Of newly-iound
races of men, has always been more or lees
considerably abated, by such nauseous pic
lures of the vilest savage depravity, igno-
rance and gross sensuality, that in contem-
plating them the mind of moral purity was
kept either in constant state of oscillation
from contempt or pity 10 disgust and abhor-
renee or where things were more fayora-
bic, in state of sadness and regret at their
deplorable weakness and immortality. The
cnnnibalism of some of those nations of in
noceH good nafured islanders discovered
by Cooke--their cruel and ungenerous
manner of making war-ther proiiigate
sensuality, carried to an excess OF indie
cency almost bordering upon the udicrous
their levity, thievishness, assimilation
and bigotry, altogether formed compost
ton Of the most offensive kind-and this
was, in the end, rendered more painful by
the consequences they produced upon the
conduct of their visiters, who seldom failed
10 add to their stock OF proAigacy some
new rudimen.s in the arts Of vice-to COM
municate TO them loathsome diseases before