CHAPTER VII.
Character of Captain Cook .-- Effects of his Voyages .-- Testimonies of Applause .-- Commemorations of his Services--Regard paid to his Family .-- Conclusion.
From the relation that has been given of Captain Cook's course of life, and of the important events in which he was engaged, my readers cannot be strangers to his general character.

This, therefore, might be left to be collected from his actions, which are the best exhibitions of the great qualities of his mind.

But, perhaps, were I not to endeavour to afford a summary view of him in these respects, I might be thought to fail in that duty which I owe to the public on the present occasion.
It cannot, I think, be denied, that genius belonged to Captain Cook in an eminent degree.

By genius, I do not here understand imagination merely, or that power of culling the flowers of fancy which poetry, delights in; but an inventive mind; a mind full of resources; and, which, by its own native vigour, can suggest noble objects of pursuit and the most effectual methods of attaining them.

This faculty was possessed by our navigator in its full energy, as is evident from the uncommon sagacity and penetration which he discovered in a vast variety of critical and difficult situations.
To genius Captain Cook added application, without which nothing very valuable or permanent can be accomplished, even by the brightest capacity.