The Russellville Democrat., 1891-05-28
WELCOME ADDRESS
By Rev. R. s. Desner to the Arkansas
 Newspaper Men.
The Warm and Generous Greeting Ex- tended Them by the City eff
 BatssviIle.


 After nearly eleven years of joy and
 sorrow, triumph and failure, evolution
 and progress, Batesvile again with open hearts, hands and homes, well
 comes you-Arkansas' most distin-
 guished sons. We have expected you,
 and now that you are here, our feelings
 belle the old adage, "The anticipation
 is sweeter than the realization,' and we
 are gladder than we dreamed that you
 have come. We beg truce 10 the
 semi mi-hypocritical stereot, pc that our
 welcome is stgenuine and heartfelt Our
 appreciation of your visit cannot be
 shown in the clumsy vehicle of an ad-
 dress of welcome; but in the eloquenoe Of the hearty hand shake, in the cor
 diality that beams from every face, we hope to make you feel at home among us. We bid you drink of our pure . sparkling waters, to rest under the shade of our trees, to share the hos | pitality of our board, 10 be entranced If you will by the charms of our music, to ! dream amidst the intoxicating sweet ness of our flowers and, overstepping l the distance that ''lends enchaniment | to the view" behold face to face the beauty and grace sf Batesville women. We welcome you as the representa- tive thinkers of this state, and better still, as the molders of public
 mind, the guardians of the public good. We welcome you as the leaders l of public enterprise, the nations best protectors and humanity's best teach CTS. In fact, gentlemen, so wonderful are your opportunities and so un- bounded your influences that l am com pelled to consider before you ques- l 1f the secular press be secured as might fer reinforcement to religion, higher education of the masses and better citizenship
 The first step toward such consum- nation is cessation of indiscriminate hostility against newspapers. The legal profession had as well be denounced because of shysters, or the medical pro- fession because of quacks, or the mer- camille because of swindling bargain makers as to fight newspapers because there are recreant editors and unfair reporters and unclean columns. Gut .enberg. the inventor of the art of print ing, was about to destroy the types and extinguisb the art because 1t was sug- gested to him that printing might be suborned into the service of the devil. here are many to-day in the depressed hood of Guttenberg, with uplifted ham, mer wanting to pound to pieces the type. who have not reached their better mood in which they saw the art of printing to be the rising sun of the worlds illumination If, instead of fighting newspapers, we spend the same length of time and the same vehemence in marshalling their help in the intel- lectual and moral advancement of the people we would be as much wiser as the man who gets consent of the rail- road superintendent to fasten csr to the end of his train than he who runs his wheelbarrow up the track to meet and drive back limited express. The silliest thing man ever did Is to fight a newspaper.
 In this effort, as stated, we should make the press the avenue of right in- formation. If you put the facts of churches and schools only in the de- nominational and educational journals, which do not in this country have an average of more than l0, 900 subscribers, what have we done as compared with what we do if put these facts through the secular press, which have hundreds of thousands of readersp Every little denomination and every little school uiuSt Hdfe us lftlit OiRdu. cuPpOittu great expense, when with one-half the outlay column or half column of space might be rented in some semi omnipotent secular publication, ard so the information would be sent roun1 and round the world. The biggest financial hole ever dug in this American continent is the hole into which good people throw their money when they start a newspaper. It is Inalmost as good and as quick way
 Of getting rid of money as buying stock in an Arkansas gold mine. Not more printing presses, but right to use those already ests blished. All their cylinders, all their presses, all their power, pens, types, editorial chairs and reportorial rooms are available if you would engage them in behalf of human ity and civilization.
 How about the Sunday daily? Use \tbat, too. We must learn to take some
 Rkings as they are. We should like 10
 see the much scoffed at old Puritan
 Sabbath back again. The modern Sab
 nth Is not apt to turn out any better
 hen and women than your grand par
 Tents were. To say nothing of other re-
 n1ltS.- -tba Sunday paper is killing ed-
 Is, T, ,porters, compositors and press
 h. Every man, woman and child on
 1rth is entitled to twenty -four hours
 bf nothing to do. Our literary
 mrn die fast enough without
 Killing themselves with Sunday
 work. But the Sunday paper has
 home to stay. It will stay much longer
 than you or I will stay. What, then,
 spall we do? Persuade all those who
 i've anything 10 do with issuing 1t to
 1t with moral information and facts
 Eating. Urge them that all divorce
 les be dropped out, and instead, put
 good advice as to how husband and
 fife should live together. Put in small
 Type the behavior of the swindling
 thurch member, and in large type the
 ntribu,ion of some Christian man to-
 Ards sn asylum for feeble minded hil6Ten or a seaside sanitarium. In be-
 half of the American people we urge 1 you to put impurity ana meanness in agate or pearl type and Christian con- sistency in breyier or long primer. Let the Sunday paper be a factor of power
 for ihe worlds betterment. And in-
 dulge us the dream-not UtOpian we trust-that the Sunday paper may yet be circulated in The Sunday schools on Sabbath morning filled with food, in- tellectual and spiritual, for Gods holy Gay.
 We have but rudely outlined a course
 If procedure which seems to us reason
 able and legitimate. Time forbids
 hrther comment.
 Behold the vastness of your field, the
 grandeur of your opportunities. You
 are improving them. The records of
 the ages will bear witness 10 your
 fidelity to the cause of truth and right,
 and generations to. come will not be
 unjust in their criticism of your virtues.