e policy, carried on by
public authority, and concluded by a fixed establishment in a country
very remote, not only excites an unusual interest concerning the fate of
those sent out, but promises to lead us to some points of knowledge
which, by the former mode, however judiciously employed, could not have
been attained. A transient visit to the coast of a great continent
cannot, in the nature of things, produce a complete information
respecting its inhabitants, productions, soil, or climate: all which when
contemplated by resident observers, in every possible circumstance of
variation, though they should be viewed with less philosophical
acuteness, must yet gradually become more fully known: Errors, sometimes
inseparable from hasty observation, will then be corrected by infallible
experience; and many objects will present themselves to view, which
before had escaped notice, or had happened to be so situated that they
could not be observed.

The full discovery of the extent of New Holland, by our illustrious
navigator, Capt. Cook, has formed a singular epocha in geography; a doubt
having arisen from it, whether to a land of such magnitude the name of
island or that of continent may more properly be applied. To this
question it may be answered, that though the etymology of the word
island,* and of others synonymous to it, points out only a land
surrounded by the sea, or by any water, (in which sense the term is
applicable even to the largest portions of the habitable globe) yet it is
certain that, in the usual acceptation, an island is conceived to signify
a land of only moderate extent, surrounded by the sea.** To define at what
point of magnitude precisely, a country so situated shall begin to be a
continent, could not answer any purpose of utility; but the best and
clearest rule for removing the doubt appears to be the following: As long
as the peculiar advantages of an insular situation can be enjoyed by the
inhabitants of such a country, let it have the title of an island; when
it exceeds those limits let it be considered as a continent. Now the
first and principal advantage of an island, is that of being capable of a
convenient union under one government, and of deriving thence a security
from all external attacks, except by sea. In lands of very great
magnitude such an union is difficult, if not impracticable, and a
distinction founded on this circumstance, is therefore sufficient for
convenience at least, if*** no