first view, an apparent hardship in sending men to be disbanded so far from their native land, after the fatigues, perhaps, of a lengthened war; yet, as they would be left at liberty to dispose of their estates as soon as cleared, if they should not choose to cultivate them, and would thus secure a property of four or five hundred pounds to enerease the comforts of their old age, the objection loses much of its force. The great advantages of employing a regiment, as a body, in the clearance of land, and then dividing by lot to each man his proportional share, must occur to the mind the very first moment one thinks on the subject. The men, in such circumstances, act under authority, and the work is done regularly and systematically; and we all know, there are thousands of persons who would engage heartily in the cultivation of a hundred acres of cleared land, who would shrink from the previous labour of cutting down the trees, and of grubbing out the goots. At the conclusion of the revolutionary war, accordingly, when Government granted certain tracks of land to particular regiments, the ground being divided among the men, in an uncleared state, was abandoned by the majority of them, or sold for a trifle; and it was only a few of the more industrious who cleared and cultivated their own portions, or purchased those of the others; on which, however, they had the satisfaction to leave their descendants in the condition of opulent farmers, and to see them spring up around them as the chief support of provincial independence. We may give an instance too, with which we are supplied in this little volume, of the rapid progress in the clearing of land, which is made by a body of men working in concert. The colony of Berbice was cleared and settled full three quarters of a mile into the interior, for near sixty miles extending along the sea coast, and the shores of the rivers Berbice and Corantain, in the comparatively short space of seven years. There the labour was performed by negroes, while that performed by whites, in a temperate climate, would be as three to one in favour of the latter; besides the clearance in this instance required that, around every lot of a thousand acres, a dike or fosse, nine feet wide and six feet deep, should be dug, for the purpose of draining. How much then might be accomplished by a body of one thousand men, labouring in unison, and with the certainty of a speedy recompence before their eyes! We agree with the author in thinking, that more land would be cleared by such a corps in one year, than by the same number of individuals, unorganized and uncontrouled, in the space of twelve years. of twelve years. In short, if Government should ever dcem it expedient to give land in America to the discharged military, there can be no doubt that it should be cleared by the men before they are disembodied; for, by this means, the ground ground will, in the first place, be actually cleared, and secondly, there is every chance that it will be also occupied by those who clear it. A double advantage would be gained by the country, were this plan adopted; the old soldier would be richly provided for, at a very small expence, and our colonies would be furnished with an efficient population, who would not only be instrumental in defending the frontiers by their own personal bravery, but would also instruct the young in the use of arms. It would also prove an inducement to the people of this country to enter into the regular army, were they to see before them not only a limit to their service in active war, but also the means of providing for the wants of age, and the comfort of their surviving families. Had it not been for this powerful stimulus, the United States, it is said, could not have raised an army at all; and in this particular it would be wisdom in us to learn from an enemy, whose motions we have to watch, and whose policy we have to coun teract. When writing on the defence of our American provinces, it naturally occurs to mention the great importance of having a powerful fleet on the lakes. Our failures in the last war, bo'h on the ocean and in the inland seas, arose chiefly from the inadequacy of our means, generally considered, to encounter the enemy's force, and more especially from the small number of seamen, either able or ordinary, on board our ships. It appears from a General Order, issued by the commander in chief, Sir G. Prevost, that in the whole of our squadron, on Lake Erie, there were not not more than fifty sailors; the crews consisting, for the most part, of militiamen, peasantry, and raw recruits, total strangers, of course, to naval tactics, and to every point of seamanship. A great inistake was, no doubt, committed in 1783, by those who adjusted the boundaries between British and Independent America, in giving to the latter so very extensive a line of coast, and the strongest positions on almost all the lakes; more particularly, as a straight line drawn from the point at which the commissioners begun, on the river St. Lawrence, to that where they ended, on the Mississipi, would have shut out the Americans from these waters altogether. To give to that people the great advantages which they now possess, it was necessary to turn off, at a right angle, from the natural direction of the boundary line, the evil of which aberration, it should seem, consists not only in opening up to our enemies the means of creating a naval power, but moreover in interposing a tongue of land, so as actually to intercept, in certain circumstances, all communication with two districts of the upper province. This error not having been corrected by the treaty of Ghent, we shall be be put to the expence of maintaining a large naval armament to protect the Canadian frontiers, exposed as they must be to incessant inroads, whensoever war shall be renewed in that quarter of the world. "If Britain lose Canada," says our traveller," the loss of the West Indies must inevitably follow; and the ruin of her navy will succeed. But if she well people, and thereby strengthen Canada, the West Indies will also encrease in population; and wealth will reanimate the drooping commerce of the realm in general. And with proper restrictions on the American fisheries, the provinces may yet bear up for a short time, without feeling the direful effects of the treaty of Ghent. However, if America should think proper again to declare war, the British nation is faithfully exhorted not to conduct another contest on the principles by which the last was regulated; and not again to make peace until she can coerce the enemy into an abandonment of the whole line from St. Regis in the river St. Lawrence, to the Lake of the Woods, including also Lake Michigan and the Michigan territory, and insisting on the Americans retiring from the waters of the rivers and lakes, a few miles into the interior. All that portion, too, of the district of Maine, extending from the Grand Lake in New Brunswick, in a straight line, to the river Chandiere in Lower Canada, ought also to be secured: or, if thought more advisable, a straight line may be drawn from the confluence of the rivers Piscatagnis and Penobscot in Maine, to the same river Chandiere, and down the Penobscot to Castine, continuing it out at sea to the Isle Haute. This would include an important coast, well stored with islands and harbours." The opportunity, we apprehend, has gone by for making these desirable arrangements as to the boundaries, and there is unquestionably some rational ground for regret, that, among the British commissioners at Ghent, there was not one intimately acquainted with the topography of the country concerning whose destinies they were appointed to deliberate. Much disappointment is accordingly felt in the provinces, and the best informed people there hesitate not to assert that their interests have either not been understood or miserably neglected, in framing the late treaty. We do not hold ourselves competent to judge on such matters; but we can feel no hesitation in concurring with the sensible and patriotic writer who has suggested these remarks, in the opinion, that there is no people on earth who will so readily as the Americans, take advantage of an oversight, and that, in short, Great Britain never had an enemy more to be dreaded. We give the author thanks for the pains which he has taken to rolise the attention of the public to this most important subject, Не He has stated facts strongly and fearlessly, and evidently too with the feelings of a man who loves his country. Perhaps he does not perceive, as clearly as he ought, the difficulties which are to be surmounted in the creation of a new system; and seems occasionally to forget, that it is the duty of governments rather to guide than excite every impulse on the part of the people. We concede to him, at the same time, that emigration at present would be a national blessing, and that of all parts in the world, Canada is the colony to which it ought to be directed. 1816. ART. VIII. An Appeal to Men of Wisdom and Candour; or, Four Discourses, preached before the University of Cambridge, in November 1815. By the Rev. Charles Simeon, M. A. Fellow of King's College. 8vo. pp. 84. 2s. 6d. Cadell and Davies. WITH the Sermons before us our readers are already acquainted from our Review of Mr. Sharpe's attack upon them in the course of the preceding year. They were preached from the pulpit of the University, in November 1815, and are now but just published, for the first time. Mr. Simeon has not contented himself with becoming simply an advocate of the opinions which he espouses; he calls, in an authorative manner, upon the rising youth of the country to adopt and cherish them, he ap peals to their understandings and to their feelings in support of his cause. We do not often object to a mere title, but there is a quackery and a puffery in an "Appeal to Men of Wisdom and Candour," the larger portion of whom are below the age of twenty, which we cannot but consider as beneath the dignity of an University preacher. There is, at the same time, an air of authority, to which we do not generally object, except when it is exerted to impose upon the rising generation, a system of doctrine no less at variance with the Scriptures, than with that Church, in whose bosom they are educated. Mr. Simeon challenges an examination into the opinions and the tenets of his party, of which the Sermons before us are intended as an exposition; that examination, we trust, will be made, not by ourselves only, but by all those of his hearers who have power to determine for themselves, and influence to recommend and enforce their decision. In the first Sermon is considered the mode of forming a just estimate of the Gospel. To the larger part of this sermon we have no objection to start, we would rather say that it is fairly entitled entitled to our approbation. The former part, perhaps, is bette adapted to the meridian of a London than of a Cambridge audi ence, as the chain of argument is by no means connected in a manner which would be satisfactory to a reasoning and a searching mind. Let us take the following example: "These persons, conscious of the insufficiency of human wisdom to find out such a plan for the salvation of mankind receive with humility what God has revealed, and the instant they know his will, they receive his testimony with the liveliest gratitude, and make it the one ground of their hopes and fears." Now Mr. Simeon has forgotten that they must first be proved from reason, that is, from evidence external and internal, that the Christian scheme is the revelation of God and not a cunningly devised fable. We wonder that this most important step of all should have been omitted. It is indeed afterwards noticed, when the Revelation is taken for granted, then "it appears to stand on a basis that is immoveable." This is very like reasoning on a circle, which is all very well for those who are willing to take for granted the point in question, and afterwards from that grant go a very little to prove its existence, but will to convince an academical sceptic. Mr. S. then recommends his audience I. To form their judgment with care;-II. To exercise it with candour;-III. To implore the grace of God in their examination. In all this we cordially coincide with him; and as we, at all times, are happy to commend rather than to censure, we shall extract the following very useful advice to the theological student. way "There are confessedly many passages which are difficult to be understood, and many passages which appear to have, what may be called, an opposite and contradictory aspect. To explain all these, and to reconcile them with each other, and to gather out of them one entire and consistent plan of salvation, is surely no it should be undertaken with fear and trembling; and easy work; no pains should be spared to execute it aright. To take one set of texts, and to wrest the opposing texts to a sense which they were never designed to bear, will save us indeed much trouble, and gratify a proud contentious spirit; but it will never bring us to a just view of the truth as it is in Jesus. The way to solve the difficulties of Scripture, is to give to every declaration of God its proper force, and then to mark the subserviency of one truth to others which appear opposed to it. A person who should, in an ignorant and superficial manner, observe the opposite motions that are found in a great engine, would be ready to suppose that the wheels would obstruct each other: but on a closer inspection he would find, that there is a subserviency of one part to another, and that all the motions, however opposite in appearance, tend in reality |