Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1886-04-12
PULPIT PRAISES PRESS.
REV. TALMAGE EXPOUNDS ON
THE FLYING ROLL.

Newspapers the Great Educator of
the People-TriaIs of the Profess
sion.
BROOKLYN, n. Y, April 11.-Rev. T.
De Witt Talmage, d. d., preached before
a vast congregation this morning. The
opening hymn begins:
Before Jchoyah's awful throne
Ye nations bow with sacred joy!'
After eXpounding passages in reference
to the spread of knowledge all over the
world the eloquent speaker announced
his text: Zechariah V. i: behold ily
ing roll! DR.. Talmage said:
This winged sheet of the text had on 1t
a prophecy. The flying roll to-day is the
newspaper.E Gin calculating the influences
that affect society you can no more afford
to ignore 1t than you can ignore the noon
day sun or the Atlantic Ocean.
1t is nigh time that | preach sermon
expressing my appreciation of what the
newspaper press has done and is doing.
No man, living or dead, is or has been 80
indebted TO it as | am, for it gives me per-
petual audience in every city, town, aud
ueignbOrhOOd OF ChFistendOm. and | take
this opportunity before God and this peO-
pie to thank the editors, and publishers and
cOmpOsltOrs and type-5etters the world
over, and l give tair notice that ] shall
take every opportunity OF enlarging this
field, whether by stenOgraphic report on
the Sabbath, or gallev-prOOis on Monday,
or previous dictatiOn. | have said again
aud again to the officers of this church,
whoever else are crOwdsd, don't let the
reporters be crowded. Each responsible
and intelligent reporter is ten or fifteen
churches built on to this church. Ninety.
dive per cent. OF the newspapers are
now my friends, and do me
full Justice and more than
Justice, and the other five Of the hundred
are such notorious liars that nobody be-
lieVes them. 1t was in self-defense that
sixteen years ago l employed an official
stenCgrapher OF my own because OF the
appalling Misrepresentation Of myself
and church. From that things have
miraculously changed until now it is just
as appalling in the marvellous opportunity
opened.
The newspaper is the great educator of
the nineteenth century. There Is no force
compared with it. IL IS book, pulpit,
platform. forum, all in one. And there is
not an Observation-Disclosures literary, com
mercial, scientific, agricultural, or me-
chanical-that is not within its grasp.
All our churches, and schools, and col
leges, and asylums, and art galleries feel
The institution OF newspapers arose in
Italy. In Venice the first newspaper was
published, and monthly, during the time
that Nenice was warning against S0lyman
the Second in Dalmatia, it was printed
for the purpose OF giving military and
commercial information to the Venetians.
The first newspaper published in England
was in 1888, and called the EpgtiSb -Her-
cUTU. Others were styled the Weekly Dis
! ,1,.orpg tho Sgprgf 0grj If0r0eilfJfe JlfYpu.
etc.
VINO can estimate the political, scien-
tific, commercial and religious revOlu-
tiOns reused up in England for many years
past bv Bells Weekly DjSb0tch, the Stan
ddrd, the Morning Chronicle, the Post,
and the London Times?
The first attempt at this institution in
France was in 1851, by physician, who
published the Neirs for the amusement
and health OF his patients. The French
nation understood fully how to appreci-
ate this power. Napoleon, with his own
hand, wrote articles Tor the press, and so
early as in 1929 there were in Paris 1863
journals. But IN the United States the
newspaper has come TO unlimited sway.
Though IN 1I1J there were but 81 in the
whole country, the numberof published
journals is now counted by thousands;
and tO-day-we may as well acknowledge
III Ab nDL--lliG lGilE anu ocIAAl al iG " -
paper are the great educators of the
country.
] find no difficulty in accounting for the
worlds advance. Four centuries ago, IN
Germany, in courts of justice, men fought
with their fists to see who should have the
decision Of the court; and If the judges
decision was unsatisfactory, then the
| Judge fought with counsel. Many OF the
| lords could not read the deeds Of their own
estates. What has made the changer
"Books," YOU say.
No, sir The vast majority Of citizens
do not read books. Take this audience, or
any other prOmiscuOus assemblage, and
how many histories have they read? How
many treaties on constitutional law, or
| political economy, or works Of science
! How many elaborate poems or books OF
! travel? How much OF Boyle, or DeIOcque-
Vile, NenOphOn, or Her0dotus, or Perci-
val? Not many.
| In the United States, the people would
| not average one such book year for each.
/ individual!
Whence, then, this intelligence-this
| capacity to talk about all themes. secular
aud religlOus-this acquaintance with
! science and art-this power % appreci.
ate the beautiful aud grand? Next 70 the
! Bible, the wift-Winged. and
every where present, flying over the
! ieuCe5, snONeN un0er lne door. tossed
into the cOunting.house, laid on the work.
/ bench, hawked through the cars. All
read it.: white and black, German, Irish.
man, Swiss, Spanard, American. old and
! young, good and bad, sick and well, be.
1 fore breakfast and after tea, Monday
morning, saturday night, Sunday and
week day.
/ now declare that | consider the news
/ paper to be the grand agency by which
the Gospel is 30 be preached, Ignorance
cast out, oppression dethrOned, crime eX.
| tirpated, the world raised, heaven re-
| jOiced and God gl0rihed.
! In the cianking Of the printing press, az
the sneets fly out, ! hear the voice Of the
| Lord Almighty prOclaimlng TO all the
dead nations Of tue earth, Lazarus, come
/ forth" and to the retreating surges Of
darkness, "Let there be lightw In many
OF our city newspapers, protesting nc
more than secular information, there
have appeared during the past ten years
some OF the grandest appeals In behalf oI
| religion, and some OF the most enectiYe
Interpretations of Gods government
among the nations.
There are only two kinds OF newspa-
pers-the one good, very good, the other
bad, very bad. A newspaper may bt
started with an undecided character, but
after 10 has been going on for years every.
body hnds out just what II is; and it IL
very good or IL is very bad. The one pa.
| per - the embodiment OF news, the ally OF
virtue, the foe OF crime, the delectatiOn oi
elevated taste, the mightest agency on
earth for making the world better. The
other paper is a brigand amid moral
I fopena ia q haaHffnar ~ raunfafIau IL a.