prosecuted with a spirit equal to that with which it had been contrived: but the ardour of the European heroes only hurried them to destruction; for a long time they could not gain the territories for which they fought, and, when at last gained, they could not keep them: their expeditions, therefore, have been the scoff of idleness and ignorance, their understanding and their virtue have been equally vilified, their conduct has been ridiculed, and their cause has been defamed. When Columbus had engaged king Ferdinand in the discovery of the other hemisphere, the sailors, with whom he embarked in the expedition, had so little confidence in their commander, that after having been long at sea looking for coasts, which they expected never to find, they raised a general mutiny, and demanded to return. He found means to sooth them into a permission to continue the same course three days longer, and on the evening of the third day descried land. Had the impatience of his crew denied him a few hours of the time requested, what had been his fate but to have come back with the infamy of a vain projector, who had betrayed the king's credulity to useless expences, and risked his life in seeking countries that had no existence? how would those that had rejected his proposals, have triumphed in their acuteness? and when would his name have been mentioned, but with the makers of potable gold1 and malleable glass. 1 "Tertio monemus ut homines nugari desinant, nec tam faciles sint ut credant, grande illud opus quale est naturæ cursum remorari et retrovertere, posse haustu aliquo matutino, The last royal projectors with whom the world has been troubled, were Charles of Sweden and the Czar of Muscovy. Charles, if any judgment may be formed of his designs by his measures and his inquiries, had purposed first to dethrone the Czar, then to lead his army through pathless deserts into China, thence to make his way by the sword through the whole circuit of Asia, and by the conquest of Turkey to unite Sweden with his new dominions: but this mighty project was crushed at Pultowa1; and Charles has since been considered as a madman by those powers, who sent their ambassadors to solicit his friendship, and their generals "to learn under him the art "of war." The Czar found employment sufficient in his own dominions, and amused himself in digging canals, and building cities; murdering his subjects with insufferable fatigues, and transplanting nations from one corner of his dominions to another, without regretting the thousands that perished on the way: but he attained his end, he made his people formidable, and is numbered by fame among the demi-gods. aut usu alicujus pretiosæ medicinæ, ad exitum perduci: non auro potabili, non margaritarum essentiis, et similibus nugis." -Bacon's Works, ed. 1803, vii. 227. "The march begins in military state, And nations on his eye suspended wait; And winter barricades the realms of frost ; He comes, nor want nor cold his course delay ;- -The Vanity of Human Wishes, 1. 205. I am far from intending to vindicate the sanguinary projects of heroes and conquerors, and would wish rather to diminish the reputation of their success, than the infamy of their miscarriages: for I cannot conceive, why he that has burnt cities, wasted nations, and filled the world with horror and desolation, should be more kindly regarded by mankind, than he that died in the rudiments of wickedness; why he that accomplished mischief should be glorious, and he that only endeavoured it should be criminal. I would wish Cæsar and Catiline, Xerxes and Alexander, Charles and Peter, huddled together in obscurity or detestation. But there is another species of projectors, to whom I would willingly conciliate mankind; whose ends are generally laudable, and whose labours are innocent; who are searching out new powers of nature, or contriving new works of art; but who are yet persecuted with incessant obloquy, and whom the universal contempt with which they are treated, often debars from that success which their industry would obtain, if it were permitted to act without opposition. They who find themselves inclined to censure new undertakings, only because they are new, should consider, that the folly of projection is very seldom the folly of a fool; it is commonly the ebullition of a capacious mind, crowded with variety of knowledge, and heated with intenseness of thought; it proceeds often from the consciousness of uncommon powers, from the confidence of those, who having already done much, are easily When Rowley persuaded that they can do more. had completed the orrery, he attempted the perpetual motion; when Boyle had exhausted the secrets of vulgar chemistry, he turned his thoughts to the work of transmutation.” A projector generally unites those qualities which have the fairest claim to veneration, extent of knowledge, and greatness of design; it was said of Catiline, "immoderata, incredibilia, nimis "alta semper cupiebat."3 Projectors of all kinds agree in their intellects, though they differ in their morals; they all fail by attempting things beyond their power, by despising vulgar attainments, and aspiring to performances, to which, 1 According to an account quoted in the Penny Cylcopædia, ed. 1840, xvii. 38, it was not Rowley, but George Graham who, about the year 1700, invented the orrery. Rowley, it seems, was an instrument-maker who made the first for the Earl of Orrery. 2 Boyle had "a process for 'multiplying gold' by combining a certain red earth with mercury." Before his death he communicated it to Locke and Newton. Newton having received some of this earth from Locke told him "that though he had no inclination to prosecute the process," yet as he [Locke] had "a mind to prosecute it," he would be glad to assist him.-Brewster's Life of Newton, ed. 1855, ii. 121. Boswell says that "as to alchemy, Johnson was not a positive unbeliever, but rather delighted in considering what progress had actually been made in the transmutation of metals, what near approaches there had been to the making of gold." -Boswell's Johnson, ii. 376. The writer of the article on Robert Boyle in Knight's Cyclo. of Biog, points out "that faith in alchemy now and the same in the middle of the seventeenth century are two things so different in kind that to laugh at both in one shows nothing but the ignorance of the laugher." 8 Sallust: Catilina, ch. 5. perhaps, nature has not proportioned the force of man when they fail, therefore, they fail not by idleness or timidity, but by rash adventure and fruitless diligence. That the attempts of such men will often miscarry, we may reasonably expect; yet from such men, and such only, are we to hope for the cultivation of those parts of nature which lie yet waste, and the invention of those arts which are yet wanting to the felicity of life. If they are, therefore, universally discouraged, art and discovery can make no advances.1 Whatever is attempted without previous certainty of success, may be considered as a project, and amongst narrow minds may, therefore, expose its author to censure and contempt; and if the liberty of laughing be once indulged, every man will laugh at what he does not understand, every project will be considered as madness and every great or new design will be censured as a project. Men, unaccustomed to reason and researches, think every enterprise impracticable, which is extended beyond common effects, or comprises many intermediate operations. Many that presume to laugh at projectors, would consider a flight through the air in a winged chariot, and the movement of a mighty engine by the steam 1 An old sea-faring man wrote to Swift that he had found out the longitude. The Dean replied "that he never knew but two projectors, one of whom ruined himself and his family, and the other hanged himself; and desired him to desist lest one or other might happen to him."-Swift's Works, ed. 1803, xvii. 157. |