Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1886-04-21
nothing but pure, honest and healthful

would prefer to publish, L believe they
would unanimously say: "We would pre-
fer to publish an elevating paper" Solone
as there is an iniquitous demand there will
be an iniquitous supply. make no apollo
gy for a debauched newspaper, but am
saying these things in order to divide the
responsibility between those that print and
those who read. -
Another temptation of the newspaper
profession is the great allurement that sur
rounds them. Every occupation and pro.
fession has temptations peculiar to itself,
and the newspaper profession is not an ex-
ception. The great draught, as you know,
is on the nervous forces, and the brain is
racked. The blundering political speech
must read well for the sake of the party,
and SO the reporter, or the editor, has to
make it read well, although every SEN
tsnce was catastrophe to the English Ian
guage. The reporter must hear al thai a.:
inaudible speaker, who thinks it is vulgar
to speak out, says; and it must be right the
next morning or the next night in the pa
pers, though, the night before, the whole
audience sat with it's hand behind its ear,
in vain trying to catch it. This man must
go through killing nightwork. He must
go into heated assemblages, and into un-
ventilated audience rooms that are enough
to take the life out of him. He must visit
court rooms which are almost always dis
gusting with rum and tobacco. He must
expose himself at the fire. He must write
in fetid alleyways. Added to all that he
must have hasty mastication and irregular
habits To bear up under this tremendous
nervous strain, they are tempted to artifi-
cial stimulus, and how many thousands
have gone down under that pressure God
only knows. They must have something to
counteract the wet, they must have some
thing to keep out the chill, and after a
scant nights sleep, they must have some
thing to revive them for the morning S
work. This is what made Horace Greeley
such stout temperance man. He told me
that he had seen so many of his comrades
go down under that temptation. Oh, my
brother of the newspaper profession, what
you cannot do without artificial stimulus,
God does not want you to do. There is no
halfway ground for our literary people, be-
tween teetotalism and dissipation. Your
professional success, your domestic peace,
your eternal salvation, will depent upon
your theories in regard to artificial stimu-
lus. have had so many friends go down
under the temptation, their brilliancy
quenched their homes blasted, that cry
out this morning, in the words of another:
"Look not upon the wine when it is red,
when it moveth itself Alright in the cup; for
at last, it biteth like serpent, and it
stingeth like an adder
Another trial of this profession, is the
fact that no one seems to care for their
souls. They feel bitterly about it, though
they laugh. People sometimes laugh the
loudest when they feel the worst They
are expected to gather up religious proceed
ings, and to discuss religious doctrines in
the editorial columns, but who expects
them to be saved by the sermons they pho
nograph, Or by the doctrines they discuss
in the editorial columns? The world looks
upon them as professional Who breaches
to reporters and editors? Some of them
came from religious homes, and when they
left the parental roof, whoever regarded OF
disregarded, they came off with a father s
benediction and a mothers prayer. They
never think of those good old times but
tears come into their eyes, and they move
es'Oand this great, roaring metropolis home
sick. o, if they only knew what a helpful
thing it is for man to put his weary head
down on the bosom of sympathetic
Christ? He knows how nervous and tired
you are He has a heart large enough to
take in all your interests for this world and
the next. o men of the newspaper press,
you sometimes get sick of this world, it
seems so hollow and unsatisfying. If there
are any people in all the earth that need
God, you are the men, and you shall have
Him, if only this day you implore His
mercy.
A man was found at the foot of Canal
street. AS they picked him up from the
70
they saw by the contour of his forehead
that he had great mental capacity. He
had entered the newspaper profession. He
fetal stimulus He went down further and
hungry, and sick, and in despair, he flung
himself off the dock. They found in his
pocket reporters pad, a lead pencil, a
photograph of some one who had loved
him long ago. Death, as sometimes it will,
smoothed out all the wrinkles that had
gathered prematurely on his brow, and as
he lay there, his face was as fair as when
seven years ago he left his country home,
and they bade him goodbye forever. The
world looks through the window of the
Morgue and says: cts nothing but an
outcast''; but God says it was gigantic
soul that perished, because the world gave
him no chance.
Let me ask all men connected with the
printing press that they help us more and
more in the effort to make the world bet
ter | charge you in the name of God,
before whom you must account for the
tremendous influence you hold in this
country, to consecrate yourselves to higher
endeavors. You are the men to fight back
this invasion of corrupt literature. Lift W
your right hand and swear new allegiance to
the cause of philanthropy and religion.
And when, at last standing on the plains
of Judgment, you look ont upon the un-
numbered thropgs over whom yon have
had influence, may it be found that you
were among the mightiest energies that
lifted men upon the exalted pathway that
leads to the renown of heaven. Better thar
to have sat in editorial chair, from which,
with the finger of type, you decided the
destinies of empires, but decided them
wrong, that you had been some dun
geoned exile, who, by the light Of win
dow iron grated, on scraps of a New Tes
lament leaf, picked up from the hearth,
spelled out the story of Him who taketl
away the sins of the world.
In Eternity Dives is the Beggar?
Well, my friends, we will all soon get
through writing and printing. and proof
reading, and publishing. What then
Our life is q book. Our years are the
chapters. Our months are the paragraphs
Our days are the sentences. Our doubts
are the interrogation points. Our imitation
of others the quotation marks. Oar at
tempts at display dash. Death the pc
riod. Eternity the peroration. o God
where will we spend it? Have you heart
the news, more startling than any founC
in the Journals of the last six weeks? L
is the tidings that man is lost. Have yot
heard the news, the gladdest that wa:
ever announced, coming this day from the
throne of God, lightning couriers leaping
from the palace gate? The news! The
glorious news ! That there is pardon fol
all guilt, and comfort for all trouble. Sci
it up in ''double-eaded" columns and di
rect it to the whole race.
A Scotch poet, insane on everything bu
religion, wrote this beautiful yet strang'
rythm:
God hath pardoned all my sin,
That's the news That's the news!
feel the witness deep within,
That's the news That's the news!
And since He took my sins away,
And taught me how to watch and pray,