God hath given to any mortal man to punish. The king may make laws for the safety and good of his person, state, and subjects, against the which, whosoever is disloyal or disobedient, he may dispose of at his pleasure. The Lord hath given him this sword and authority, foreseeing in his eternal wisdom, that if this his ordinance of magistracy were not, there would be no living for men in the world, and especially for the godly; and therefore the godly have particular cause to glorify God for this his blessed ordinance of magistracy, and to regard it with all reverence.

'But now, the breach of Christ's laws, of the which we all this while speak, which is the thing only I stand upon; his kingdom is spiritual, his laws spiritual, the transgressions spiritual, the punishment spiritual, everlasting death of soul, his sword spiritual, no carnal or worldly weapon is given to the supportation of his kingdom. The Law-giver himself hath commanded that the transgressors of these laws should be let alone until the harvest, because he knows, they that are now tares may hereafter come to repentance, and become wheat; they that are now blasphemers, persecutors, and oppressors, as Paul was, may, by the power of God's word, become faithful, and a faithful witness, as he was: they that are now fornicators, &c., as some of the Corinthians once were, may hereafter become washed, cleansed, and sanctified, as they were: they that are now no people, nor under mercy, as the saints sometimes were, may here ifter become the people of God, and obtain mercy, as they did. All come not at the first hour, some come not till the eleventh hour; if those that come not till the last hour should be destroyed, because they came not at the first hour, then should they never come, but be prevented.'Pp. 121, 122.

An historical introduction, of considerable length, is prefixed by the editor; and various notes are scattered throughout the volume, in illustration or proof of the points raised. The former, particularly the early part of it, might have been abridged with advantage; and, in the event of a second edition-which we deem by no means improbable-we earnestly counsel that this should be done. Mr. Underhill has displayed very considerable research, a sound and discriminating judgment, and a keen relish and candid construction of the legacies bequeathed by the worthies of a former age, whatever their name or denominational peculiarities. The present is, we believe, his first attempt at authorship, and it is highly creditable. He will do well to cultivate compression of style, and further practice will give him ease and flexibility. If rightly informed, his editorship is a work of love, and we shall be glad to find that other men are stimulated to imitate his honourable example.

622

Art. IX.-1. Report of Captain Sturt's and Dr. Leichard's expedition in 1844, 1845, and 1846. Sydney and Adelaide, 1846.

2. Address of the Legislative Council of Western Australia to Governor Hutt. 1845.

3. Speech of the Hon. F. Scott, the Agent of New South Wales, on the Waste Lands' Bill. House of Commons, 22d August, 1846.

In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the intelligence of the discovery of another world in the west, was received throughout Europe with the deepest enthusiasm. A new era of human prosperity was foretold; and good men thought that hopes of happiness were on the point of being realized, which the most sanguine could not exaggerate. Nevertheless, after all which the Las Casas, and the Penns, and the Dupartrens, the Berkeleys, and even the Missionaries of the seventeenth century, over whom the best of modern times can claim no superiority,-could accomplish in favour of the natives of America and notwithstanding the prodigious successes of the European Americans, the old colonists and their independent sons-all this proved a mere delusion. Perfection was not of course to be hoped for in America; and no one has ever in the proper way set about the indispensable reform of what is imperfect.

The delusion has been of long duration; and our greatest statesmen persevered to the last in the grossest neglect of the only system of policy fit for a new world,-a policy by which the spread of civilized and free communities among its uncivilized natives, might be zealously fostered, and carefully accompanied by sufficient guards against violences on both sides, and with adequate means to civilize the barbarous. They even neglected to acquire a competent knowledge of events to protect the best interests of the mother country, and the claims of humanity confided to them; and many are now content to accept the welfare of the white millions who swarm over the graves of the natives of the west, as a compensation appointed by Providence for the crime of their destruction. Yet in America there was ample room for us all, if measures had been adopted at the outset, and persevered in for the common good.

Another new world is opening to our view; and it remains to be seen, whether the lessons of experience are to be thrown away; and whether, in the nineteenth century, we shall in this

This able and good man, the founder and first governor of French Grenada, devised and partially executed a system, which, fairly carried out, would have saved the Caribbs of the West Indies from extermination, and secured lasting prosperity to the colonies of France. His name deserves to be enrolled with those of Las Casas, Penn, Granville Sharpe, Clarkson, and Wilberforce.

new world only retread the steps which for four hundred years have elsewhere led to so disastrous an issue.

The veil, hitherto hanging over the interior of Australia, is obviously on the point of being raised from a very large portion of that fifth continent. It is also clear, that the British race is about to take full, corporeal possession of vast regions there, surpassed by none upon earth in the proved abundance of every kind of agricultural resources, in the promise of mineral riches, or in the blessings of a healthy climate. Our fine woolled sheep, and our cattle, prosper even within or hard upon the tropic in Australia; and whilst our adventurous travellers return from its wildernesses unharmed in the season of extremest heat, the natives so rarely assail them, that the killing of Mr. Gilbert in the last expedition, is perhaps the only instance of such an act in all New Holland discovery. The cause of the death of the kindhearted Mr. Cunningham, the botanist, beyond Bathurst, is unknown; and the benevolent Captain Barker, put to death by the natives when bathing near the site of the present Adelaide, was a victim of their ignorant vengeance for the frightful sufferings inflicted on them and their women by our sailors.

A better return is due to the simple native of Australia for the interest he takes in our progress, than to destroy him as we are doing by measures more or less rapid, and only because the colonial office has refused to reduce into a system, and to apply on a proper scale, the ways already tried with much success, for his protection and improvement.

A grand error of the government has lain in its want of confidence in the good feelings of the Colonists on this subject. Some years ago, the late Sir George Murray, when secretary of state, exhibited an instance of this. His own good intentions are not to be disputed, as could be shown in some of his despatches respecting the Canadian Indians; but he was ill acquainted with the colonies; and when speaking upon reforms claimed on behalf of the Aborigines, he objected to them on the ground of the government being bound to consider the prejudices of the Colonists. The caution was misapplied even at that time; for colonial history proves that an active, zealous party, has always existed in the colonies, whose countenance could be depended on in support of prudent measures of benevolence, whilst the mass of the people would respect whatever of that kind the government might do. This may be asserted with the greatest confidence in reference to New South Wales, during the whole of its sixty years existence as a British settlement.

Wild cattle, from the old colony of New South Wales, have been found in millions' west of the Darling River; and it is said that they have penetrated as far west as the back of the Swan River colony.

At present there may be adduced very remarkable evidence to the same effect. The legislative assembly of the colony, among its earliest proceedings, after being made elective, entered upon a serious inquiry into the questions of the Aborigines; and the agent of the colony, Mr. Scott, in in a laboured address to the House of Commons in August last, on behalf of the remote settlers, places the interests of the Aborigines among the prominent objects of their sympathy. The energy of these men is unparalleled in the annals of peaceful enterprise. In fourteen years they have covered a region, 1,600 miles by 300, with their flocks and herds; and their representative in Parliament declares boldly that it is safe to look to them for the civilization of the natives,' if they are themselves treated with justice. On the other hand, it is certain to demonstration, that if the government do not take the lead in this case, and adopt measures proportioned to its necessity, these men will gradually destroy, the very natives whom, under proper guidance, they will best protect.

The government, then, must delay no longer to establish a wise system of justice and beneficence on behalf of the natives of all the Australias.

That such a system may be established there is no reason to doubt. Something like it has succeeded at the Swan River, where, according to the solemn declaration of the Legislative Council in September of last year, Governor Hutt had taken ‘a deep interest in the welfare of the Aborigines, and adopted humane and judicious measures for their improvement.' To those measures the Council expressly attributed 'the friendly intercourse which had long subsisted between the Colonists and them, and their advancing civilization.'-(Colonial Gazette, 16th May, 1846.)

When the colonial office shall be fairly awakened by the call for administrative reform, now ringing in the ears of its terrified subalterns, or rather when Earl Grey and Mr. Hawes shall have fairly worked out their loudly promised and wisely begun colonial regeneration, there will be produced to Parliament a good analysis of all that has been doing for and against the Aborigines, not in Western Australia only, by Governor Hutt and and his predecessors; but also in South Australia, which has lately been held forth as a pattern for administrations on this head; at Port Philip, under Mr. Latrobe, an honoured name in the annals of colonial philanthropy, in Van Dieman's Land, before the natives were utterly swept away; in New South Wales, with its most remarkable native experience since 1787; and finally, in North Australia, where successions of respectable and enterprising men have been silently preparing

for England a new and bright link in the chain of settlements, which are fast binding the ends of the earth together.

The few and scattered glimpses afforded to Parliament on the affairs of the Aborigines of the Australias, even during the last nine years, do not justify the common despondency as to the possibility of civilizing those hitherto untrained and unprotected people. Still less do even these slight notices encourage the fatal confidence placed by Parliament in the manner in which the colonial office has from first to last administered their affairs. How can ends be attained, if the means at command for their attainment be obstinately rejected?

But the time is come for all parties to give up their culpable apathy upon this case; and the government, the philanthropists and the colonists will find a great reward in combining their efforts to turn to the best account a race, whose improvement has always corresponded with the pains prudently taken to improve it. The whole range of human history offers nothing more interesting than the picture which this race presents to the philosophic observer and the Christian. Few people are better known to us-none are really more docile-and the disgrace will be heavy indeed upon Great Britain, if we continue our heartless neglect of them.

The two last expeditions of discovery throw so advantageous and so strong a light upon the natives of Australia, that the simple narratives of the two respectable travellers will not fail to excite a warm sympathy in their cause.

It is due to the older explorer, Captain Sturt, to give his strange adventure in the heart of New Holland, the precedence, although he seems to rate low the facts he has brought to light. The expedition of Dr. Leichardt from Moreton Bay to Port Essington, opening a huge block of the north-east of the continent with every attraction to the settler, will certainly produce the more profitable results. It establishes satisfactorily that we have at least half a dozen fresh colonies to found there under auspicious prospects, in reference to the eastern Archipelago, and of inestimable value in themselves. But more than one point in the veteran Sturt's journey will be found to deserve deep and early attention.

In the middle of 1844, Captain Sturt took a considerable party to explore the centre of New Holland. He passed the Darling, which he had himself traced long ago from New South Wales to the eastern ocean, and then as now, he avoided any rupture with the natives. On this occasion he met with one of those reports not uncommon with tribes whose registers of events are not kept with the correctness of civilized life. A party of Europeans, it was said, had been recently massacred in the interior.