Explorers Abel Tasman and James Cook both received recommendations to regard during their explorations of the ‘Great South Land’, Australia.
As historian Manning Clark contends, Tasman and those from the Dutch exploration who he labels “Protestants” considered their journey as a solely economical one, seeing Australia, as it became known as, as a land containing “many excellent and fertile regions… there [may be] found many rich mines of precious and other metals… so that it may be confidently expected that the expense and trouble that must be bestowed in the eventual discovery of so large a portion of the world, will be rewarded with certain fruits of material profit and immortal fame”. He argues however, that Cook and those of his fleet were men of the Enlightenment school of thought who relied upon science to explain the world, and who did not on a surface level communicate their voyage as being for colonising purposes but instead for anthropological reasons. Clark describes Cook as a “fine representative of the righteous and upright man not sustained by the consolations of religion”, an opinion which certainly glorifies such ‘Enlightened’ men, and the ‘hints’ by Lord Morton that he was asked to consider certainly assume this. This document however, is not as idealistic as it appears, later recommending Cook and his partners to present the natives with amicable signs in ‘trinkets’, the response to which “might be distinctly observed, before a second landing were attempted”. Clark’s distinction of explorers according to their religious beliefs is fairly poignant in the assessment of each recommendation’s main thesis.
As historian Manning Clark contends, Tasman and those from the Dutch exploration who he labels “Protestants” considered their journey as a solely economical one, seeing Australia, as it became known as, as a land containing “many excellent and fertile regions… there [may be] found many rich mines of precious and other metals… so that it may be confidently expected that the expense and trouble that must be bestowed in the eventual discovery of so large a portion of the world, will be rewarded with certain fruits of material profit and immortal fame”. He argues however, that Cook and those of his fleet were men of the Enlightenment school of thought who relied upon science to explain the world, and who did not on a surface level communicate their voyage as being for colonising purposes but instead for anthropological reasons. Clark describes Cook as a “fine representative of the righteous and upright man not sustained by the consolations of religion”, an opinion which certainly glorifies such ‘Enlightened’ men, and the ‘hints’ by Lord Morton that he was asked to consider certainly assume this. This document however, is not as idealistic as it appears, later recommending Cook and his partners to present the natives with amicable signs in ‘trinkets’, the response to which “might be distinctly observed, before a second landing were attempted”. Clark’s distinction of explorers according to their religious beliefs is fairly poignant in the assessment of each recommendation’s main thesis.
Both documents insinuate if not discuss the underlying reason for exploration in colonisation. Tasman was instructed to believe that “such lands [Great South Land] justly belong to the discoverer and first occupier [unless] it is a populated region of which the consent of the people or the king will be required”, while Morton’s “hints” to the Endeavour Expedition declare that “no European nation has the right to occupy any part of their country, or settle among them without their voluntary request”. These two distinct opinions came to little use however, as the Dutch had little desire to settle even the area they named ‘New Holland’ as they viewed it “a land of flies and sand and savages”. Conversely, many historians argue that Morton’s recommendations were disregarded, including Bruce Buchan who points to the ‘loophole’ of terra nullius meaning ‘no person’s land’ as superseding this and that there was a common belief that “ownership rested on occupying land by cultivation”, which Europeans did not deem that the Aborigines had undertaken. Buchan follows a more revisionist view of the Enlightenment men as not glorifying their position as opposed to what earlier historians such as Clark have tended to do. Alternatively, Buchan sees the European Enlightenment as having “fundamental connection between property and politics” which contradicts the often assumed view that ‘Enlightened’ men were more accepting of the rights of new peoples rather than being restrained by ancient religious belief.
The recommendations to Tasman and Cook respectively do both agree upon the importance of discovering this new “Great Southern Land” whether for trade and industry purposes or supposed anthropological reasons to better understand the world, while both have interest in colonisation as well.
This image of James Cook arriving in Botany Bay surveying the land. The artist shows Cook's hopes for the new land, as a place of new possibility and hope, directing men to where they should occupy the land. Poignantly, it also shows aboriginal warriors in the background, their stance almost in protest to the arrival and proposed cultivation and future ownership of the area. (Source: http://search.slv.vic.gov.au/primo_library/libweb/action/display.do?ct=display&doc=SLV_VOYAGER1805240&indx=22&frbg=&dum=true&vl(1UI0)=contains&vid=MAIN&srt=rank&indx=21&tab=default_tab&vl(11480836UI1)=images&vl(10247183UI0)=any&ct=Next%20Page&scp.scps=scope%3A(SLV_VOYAGER)%2Cscope%3A(SLV_DIGITOOL)%2Cscope%3A(SLVPRIMO)&vl(freeText0)=james%20cook&fn=search&mode=Basic , E. Phillips Fox, c.a 1960).
