Raftsman's journal. [volume] (Clearfield, Pa.) 1854-1948, 1857-09-23
ITCH FOR SCANDAL.


Cutancous eruptions indicate that the sys-
TEN is internally diseased. The prurient curl
osity and passion for scandal and bloody news.
prevalent in our day, are morbid symptoms.
They testify TO deep constitutional maladies
in the body polite and ecclesiastic. They
show that mental attention is diverted from
the centre to the surface. Tho love of the
startling. the horrible and the criminal is i'm
mcnsely stimulated 10y the daily and weekly
press. SSociety begins, like the old lady, TO
overcome its scruplcs, and ''relish its mur-
ders.'' Magazine literature has one stock in
trade, which is fun, another stock In trade,
which is blood, and between the two the pub
lie interest oscillates. When it cannot break
fast on an accident it calls for a joke. When
it is denied pun it clamors for shipwreck
or riot. The truth is, victims of gos-
| sip. News has caught the hydrophobia.
Newspapers bundles of scandal, and
disgusting publicity is carried into the sancti-
| ties Of home and the privacies of daily life-
The Athenian passion for news has passed be-
yond the bounds of single city, and has be-
come the morbid appetite of the civilized
world.
Let US concede that it is well to know tho
great facts of society. Grant that We arc
learning the natural history OF man when We
record his acts of every day, good or i'll, as
exhibited on the vast scale of cities and conti-
nents. The elopcment, the murder, the mob,
the accident, significant hints of the sort
of creature that calls himself lord Of this lower
world. But what we demonstrate against as
r,orI,i6 aud is tho custOm so
common of going into all the vile details,
and daguerreotyping TO the life the wound,
blood, lust, or vilany. Give the facts of the
trial, but let the Thousand disgusting particu-
lars go. Some things arc too bad to be pub
lished, and some that are not too bad are too
abominably foolish to be entitled to that honor.
Record, if you please, the murder, the riot,
the explosion, the forgery, but let not the
journalist infame or corrupt hundred thou
sand minds by putting in every word, image,
inucndo, or oath, with which they may be
garnished. We shall begin to think tha:
stenography is amsnable at the bar of public
morals. What, for example, could those stad
Scots have been thinking ofwhen they poured
out all that more than French correspondence
of Madeline Smith, lately tried for numbering
the world Trials as well as executions
might better have, if that is the cue, only
select audience of spectators.
We seriously object to the publication of
a weekly list of failures. For it pImpers tho
lust of scandal. 1t gives opportunity for hato
and malice to wound with blow that cannot
be healed. Ii is not unirequently proved de-
fectivc or premature; and while it may have
some plausible excuses, as practlsed here and
in England, it has more substantial and fatal
objections.
But the worst of all is, what Addison calls
'.Gospel gossip.'' Here the tongue is san
unruly evil, full of deadly poison How
many of the difficulties of parishes, the fire.
quent changes in the ministry, and the small
earthquakes in choir and church, are due to
ears itching for some scandal, and tongues
but too umble to join in the unholy alliance.
The cases OF church discipline, so-called, are
frequently nothing more than instances of the
sacrifice of character and reputation at the
shrine of gossipry.
We have one general rule in publication.
Proclaim the good and let the evil die. We
do not wish to rake over the kennel or stir the
fetid pool. We would no: .ring tainted joints
of meat and rotten vegetables TO our dinner
tables, and we ought just as little serve up to
our readers all the loathsone, wicked and
pestiIential matter with which journaldoa
recks. We do not require TO be told every
morning tina: man is weak, isyle, TIA. society
is out of joint, but conccdipg all that. End
writing the world as base aud corrupt as you
please, let give the skepcfni, sound side.
for there is one. By the present cGSsO.. eva
bcgets evil, murder suggests murder, suicide
mu,tipli suicide, especially when the iufam7
matory details all given in the most vivid
coIors ssBc not overcome OF evil, but over
come evil with good ''-CH.i,ttan hqave!.