The Greenville times. [volume] (Greenville, Miss.) 1868-1917, 1894-03-10
NJURIOUS sESsAfIOSALISM.


Suicides and murders are proper
Items Of news in the territory where
the parties are known, but beyond it
they are absolutely without interest.
10 addition to this, their influence is
displriting, and calculated to furth-
er the idea that the world Is growing
worse, aud that sooner or later every
thing is going to the demnition bow
wows.n
This extract is taken from the Manu-
facturers Record. Its truth aud wis
dom Is incou;rovertible. Every hor.
ror is seized upon with avidity and
made pungeut with the keeuest sauces
known to the reportorial recipe. Sick.
ening details are shredded into the
hellbroth aud ii is seasoned with poi
sou and stirred with pens dipped in
depravity, and tho vile dish, thick aud
slab with putrescence, is served Impair.
TALLY to those whose appetiies crave
such food and TO the refined aud deli.
cate whose natures revolt at its naus-
eousness. The more hideous aud ap-
palllng the crime, the bigger and black
er the bead liues that announce it aud
the more minute the research into its
loathsome details. Before the days of
associated press dispatches and tele-
graphic communication crime was
seldom reported beyond the neighbour
hood In which it occurred. The
modern facilities for the transmission
of news has produced the impression
that the world is growing worse. Il
Is favorite observation with old
fashioned people that in their young
days the world was not so bad a place
as now and that the newspapers were
not such budgets oil horrors that they
dared not allow them to enter their
homes without surveillance. This is
true so far as the papers are concern
ed, but it is not probable that crime
has increased. The facilities for dis
seminating news have increased i'm
measurably, and in equal ratio the
greed for sensation has increased.
1t is safe to say that more harm has
been done to the prosperity of the
south in the past twenty years by this
lurid blazoning of crime within lts
borders than by the combined effect
of all other causes. Certain papers
IN the north, and certain element of
the people of that section appear to
be possessed by "tyrannous hate" OF
all thugs southern, aud any occur
renee which may rebound to tho dis.
credit of the south is to them sweet
morsel.
SO widespread Is this disposition to
enlarge upon aud magnify acts oflaw'
lessness lu our borders thatit has even
the appearance of a malicious conspir'
acy. 1t Is probably In great meas
ure due to this cause that settlers have
avoided this portion of the union, ant
have preferred to make their homes II
the north west, where the disadvan
tage of climate is infinitely greater
and the lawlessness no whit less thar
| in the south. The Northwest is settlet
and prosperous, Notwithstanding it
great drawbacks, while the south is a
yet comparatively untried field; ant
the chief reason Is that the former sec
ton has had the advantage of as ex
tensive and false advertisement of III
excellence as the latter has had of ii
evil. Misrepresentation cannot pre-
vail forever, however. The truth !
becoming known at last, aud th
rapidly awakening interest In south
ern resources, enterprises, methods
and habits of life is already resultln,
in a steady stream of immigrant
whose ignorance had beon imposed
upon by the glsring and malignan
calumnies of agents and corporation
aided by a mendaclous and unscrupu
lous press.