The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1871-06-27


NEWSPAPER MoRALITY.-Tti is a great
mistake 10 suppose that newspapers can
not deal with certain universal vices be-
cause to speak Of them is to advertise
them and really multiply vice. 1t is in
this, as elsewhere, question OF method.
A preacher may so set forth Christianity
as to disgust every sensible hearer, and
rcpel those whom another shall persuade,
as the south wind persuades buds in the
spring. There is no difficulty, however
apparently unmanagcabe, that a newspa-
per may not deal with successfully if it
deals skillfully. But the timdity and
the pruriency that are sometimes observ-
able in the press are due mainly to the
public itseli--to the reader. If the de-
basing influence of French fiction is some
times seen in the English novel, it is be-
cause the results of that influence are
found to be acceptable to the reader.
The excuse of a single reader-of that
one, for instance, who is at this moment
reading these lines-is that one man does
not count that his influence is nothing.
And it is remarkable that an age which
breaches so loudly the gospel Of individ-
ual action which asserts the very unit of
society to be the individual, should be the
time also in which every man is so likely
to depreciatc his individual inhucnc and
weight, and so apt to forbear the attempt
to exercise it,
1t would be curious to trace in this
country, which is politically organized
upon the declaration of equal individual
right, the reasons of this want of conf
dence in individual influence, and the
lack of a deep sense of individual respon-
sibility Much, of course is to be at
tributed to the universal Difference to the
majority. As De Quincey says that a
man who INDUCES himself in murder
will presently come to Sabbath-breaking
and procrastination, so those who defer
to the majority in all great public con-
Germs will find themselves easily yield.
ing to it in private duties. The tenden-
cy Of u popular system is to force a
man TO regard himself as one drop only
in the flood of the majority. He for.
gets that the flood is only an aggregate
Of drops. So he does not feel that the
public is but the private multiplied
He reads an offensive paper, he sees &
mean action-"'The public likes it =
he says, with shrug and sigh. Who
likes it? Why do they not bring thcil
influence to bear What he says is on
ly an excuse for his cowardice.
If the public--if any number of per
sons-wish the press to grapple witt
great evils, to expose evil-doers of cv
cry kind, and not only to rebuke vic,
in the slums, but dishonesty and cor
ruption in high position, it must sturdi
ly sustain it, while it holds it to tn,
strictest responsibility. 1t was Cail
: who asked, cam | my brothers keeper ?
} and there are many and many who still
excuse themselves under the same plea
While, therefore, the honorable editor
whatever he may say, does not make hi
) paper--as he ought not to make it;
} mere dead wall upon which every quacl
and criminal may paste his placard a
} pleasure, but aims to make the honest
not the dishonest, convenience of the pub
5 lie his private profit, the individual read
er has the same interest with the cdito
in the general well-being He must d
his part. 1t is not, indeed, entirely tru
: either that the press makes the public
l or the public the press. But there is al
immense reciprocal influence And
7 the parent walking in the streets
/ shocked to see in the shop windows
, certain kind of illustrated paper, to who's
debasements his children even in passin
f are exposed, it is not enough for him t
| protest that the public delights in filth
t lor some terrible Nathan will say to ey
| cry such David, Have you done, and ar
you doing, what you can as an individu;
p to correct the taste which demands thos
c pictures, or do you idly think that on
n man can do nothing? Every man VIII
S does great work believes as effectiy
: reformers always believed, that one wit
c God is majority