Marshall County Republican. (Plymouth, Ind.) 1856-1878, 1875-06-17
The Slanderer.

dial mOnger is to society. His track is
blighting and desolating. The gossip,
the scandal monger and slanderer, are
pests in society equally as pernicious to
the moral world as the chinch bug. the
grasshOpper and the potato bug, in the
physical AS the grasshopper cuts
down and destroys the green beauty of
the field and blasts the promises of har-
vest, so the slanderer moves through
society blasting and defiling whatever he
touches. The well-earned reputation of
a lifetime, the coveted honors of true
manhood, and the sensitive virtue of
woman, he takes for his prey. And
where he cannot destroy, he blurs, and
stains, and blows the foul breath of
suspicion.
The work of the slanderer and scam
dal-monger penetrates every channel of
society. These moral pests seek usual
ly to blacken the character of the no.
blest and best. They are actuated by
a variety of motives. Sometimes it
seems to be a pure love for the evil
work. Sometimes it is born of malice.
The person against whom the tongue
of the slanderer is protruded, has stood
in the serpent's way, and he must have
his revenge. Upright himself, he is not
forever on his guard against the evil
Vaccinations of .others, and before he
is aware even that he has an enemy,
the slanderer'S work is telling upon
him in averted looks, and mods of sus-
picion. The slanderer stabs in private
conversation; and often he enlarges his
field by means of the newspaper. The
last few years have been the very mil
lennium of SANDER, through the news
paper press. The tongue of envy and
malice has been loosened, and very few
have escaped. DetractiOn and SANDER
have been certain to follow the man of
upright conduct and firm principles.
who would not yield to the solicitations
of the unworthy. Men in public posi-
tiOns have been the especial mark for
these poisoned arrows, and when the
shaft is sped. the cry goes forth at once
that he must prove himself innocent,
or he must be held as scOundrel. 1t
is a wise and beneficent principle of
our heritage of English common law
that the worst criminal is to be pre-
sumed innocent until proved guilty;
but this is to be reversed in the case of
the slanderer, and when the trail of the
reptile has passed over him, all his pre-
vious life of honor and integrity is to
count for nothing, and he is called on
to prove his innocence.
As soon as a man has attained posi-
ton of influence, especially if it be Off
cial influence, he is i'm the way of some
person, and he must be put down.
Then all manner of SANDER is invented
and circulated to his injury, and if he
says nothing. it is declared that the
charges are true or he would deny them;
if he denies them, then it is said, ''let
him show clean hands," Such man
has perhaps failed to crafty a political
adherent who wanted some official favor
at his hands, and forthwith stream of
of vituperatiOn is hurled upon him, a
perfect deluge of abuse, detractiOn and
falsehOOd; and not satisfied with this,
at length open charges of bribery and
corruption are made, without a shadow
of Justification, simply and only to graf
ify personal malice. There ought to be
remedy for all this. The reputation
of men should be as sacred as their
horses or their pocket books. If the
thief steals or attempts to steal, our prop
erty, he is sent to the penitentiary,
though he may have been driven to
the crime by the pinchings of poverty.
But the wretch who would steal repu-
tations, from a motive of malice alone,
stalks among his fellOw-men, and
boasts of his exploits. The course of
public men has been all wrong in this
matter. The victim of the slanderer
should appeal to the law at once. 1t is
duty he owes to society; and if there
are not laws in existence sufficient to
reach the enOrmity of the Offense of
these worst of criminals, others should
be enacted. Envy and malice should
no longer be permitted to riot at will
ON the reputation of men of integrity
and honor. The laws protect us in per-
son and estate, and it is time they
should protect us in that which is of
infinitely higher value. No man hold
ing a proper sense of the dignity of true
manhood, can hesitate as to which is to
be valued highest, property or charac-
ter; and he would prefer to have filched
from him every dollar of his goods
rather than that the least stain should
be fastened on his character.
"Who steals my purse, steals trash
But he who filches from me my good name,
Robs me Of that which not enriches him,
And makes poor indeed"
A New Juvenile Magazine.