Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1896-04-01

ing your pOcketOoOk into your wtfo's lap,
start for some insane asylum before you do
| dead newspapers, week by week, are carried
out to the burial, all the living newspapers
give respectful obituary, telling whom they
were born and when they died. The best
printers' ink should give at least ono stick
full of epitaph. II it was a good paper. say,
.'Peace to the ashes" II 1t was bad paper,
suggest the epitaph written for Francis
| Chartreuse: Here continueth to rot the
body of Francis Chartreuse. who. with an
/ fnf1exible cOnstancy and uniformity of life,
persisted in the practice of every human
vice: excepting prodfgality and hypocrisy.
the f1rst, his matchlees imprudence from the
| second" say this because I want you to
know that a good, healthy. long lived, enter.
tanning newspaper is not an easy blessing.
but one that comes to Us through the 6ra.
First of all, newspapers make knowledge
democratic and for the multitude. Tho pub
lie library is haymow 80 high up that few
ran reach It, while the newspaper throws
down the forage to our feet. Public libraries
are the reservoirs where tho great floods Arc
stored high up and away on The newspa-
per is the tunnel thar brings them down to
the pitchers Of all the peope. The chief use
OF great HNraries Is to make newspapers out
of. Great libraries make q few men and wo-
men very wiye. Newspapers lift whole Ma
tions into the sunlight. Better have 5O0,.
600, 900 people moderately intelligent than
loo. 900 solons.
false impression is abroad that newspa-
per knowledge Is ephemeral because perlodi-
Gals are thrown aside, and not one out of ten
thousand people files them for future refer
ence. Such knowledge, so far from being
ephemeral, goes into the very structure OF
the world heart and brain and decides the
edge on the shelf is of little worth. 1t is
knowledge sfoot, knowledge harnessed,
knowledge in revolution, knowledge
winged, knowledge projected. knowledge
thunderbolted. So far from being ephemer-
al, nearly all the best minds and hearts
have their hands on the printing press
to-day and have had since 1t got emanci.
pated. Adams and Hancock and Otis used
to go to the Boston Gazette and compose ar
| ticies on the rights of the people. Benjamin
Franklin, De Witt Clinton, Hamilton, Jeffer-
son, Quincy, were strong in newspaperdom.
| Many of the immortal things that have beeL
published in book form first appeared in
what you may call the ephemeral periodi-
cal. All Macaulay's essays first appeared In
! a review. All Carlyle's, all Ruskin's,
all McIntosh's. all Sydney Smiths,
ail Hazlitt's, all Thackerary's, all the ele-
! waited works Of fiction in our day are re-
prints from periodicals in which they ap-
peared as serials. Tennyson's poems. Burns 3
poems, Longfellow's poems, Emerson's po-
| ems. Lowells poems, Whittier's roems, were
once fugitive pieces. You cannot hnd ten
literary men in Christendom, with strong
| minds and great hearts: hut are or have been
somehow connected with this newspaper
printing press. While the book will always
have its place, the newspaper is more potent.
Because the latter is multitudinous do not
conclude it is necessarily superficial. II a
man should from childhood TO old age see
only his Bible. Webster's Dictionary and his
newspaper. he could be prepared for all the
I,,t;. - 10 10 NJ Iii H..
The next.
Again. good newspaper is a useful mir
ror of life as it is. 1t is sometimes COM
planned that newspapers report the evil when
they ought only to report the good. They
must report the evil :s well as the good, or
how shall we know what is to be reformed,
what guarded against. what fought down?
A newspaper that pictures only the honesty
and virtue of society is a misrepresentation.
That family is best prepared for the duties Of
life which, knowing the evil, is taught TO
select the good. Keep children under the
impression that all is fair and right in the
world, and when they go out into it they
will be as poorly prepared to struggle with
II as a child who Is thrown into the middle
, OF the Atlantic and told to learn how to
swim. Our only complaint is when sin is
made attractive and morality dull, when vice
IL painted with great headings and good
deeds are put in obscure corners, iniquiiy
set up in great primer and righteousness in
, nonpariel. Sin is loathsome; make 1t loath-
some. Virtue is beautiful; make it beauti.
full.
1t would work a vast Improvement il all
our papers-religious political, literary
should for the most part drop their imper-
sonality. This would do better justice to
newspaper writer's. Many Of the strongest
and best writers Of the country live and die
unknown and are denied their just fame. The
vast public never learns who they are. Most
0f fh.4rn ar yalx tno
and after awhile their hand forgets 1t cum
ming, and they are without resources, left to
die. Why not, at least, have his initial at
tached to his most important work? 1t al
ways gave additional force to an article
when you occasionally saw added to some
significant article in the old New York
Courier AMI Enquirer J. w. w., or in The
Tribune H. G.. or In The Herald J. G. B.. or
in The Times H. ]. R.. or in The Evening
Post w. q. B., or in The Evening Express
Z. b.
While this arrangement would be Q fair
and just thing for newspaper writer's, it would
be a defense for the public. 1t Is sometimes
true that things damaging to private charac-
ter are said Who is responsible? 1t Is the
''we" of the editorial or reporforial columne
Every man in every profession or occupation
ought to be responsible for what he does.
No honorable man will ever writethat which
he would be afraid to sign But thousands
Atty Of newspapers. What can one private
citizen wronged In his reputation do in a
contest with Misrepresentation multiplied
into twenty or fifty thousand copies? An
injustice done in print Is illimitably worse
than an injustice done In private life. Dur
ing loss OF temper man may say that for
which he will be sorry in ten minutes, but q
newspaper injustice has first to be written,
set up in type, then the proof takeE of and
read and corrected, and then for six or ten
hours the presses are busy running of the
issue, P.enty Of time to correct. Plenty OF
time to cool of. Plenty Of time to repent.
But all that Is hidde1 in the impersonaiity
of n newspaper. 1t will be- q long step for
ward when all is changed, and newspaper
writers get credit for the good and are held
responsible for the evil.
RAnother step forward for newSpa aDerdom
will be when in our colleges and univer-
stiles we open opportunities for preparing
candidates for the edit orial chair. We have
in such institutions medical departments,
law departments. Why not editorial depart
ments? Do the legal and hea'ing professions
demand more culture AMI careful training
than the editorial or reportoriai professions?
know men may tumble by what seems nc
cident into "a newspaper office as they NAV
tumble into other occupations, but 1t would
| be an incalculable advantage IL those pro'
posing a newspaper life had an institution
| to which they might go to learn the quasiti-
temptations. the dangers. the magnificent
| opportunities of newspaper life. Let there
be a lectureship in which there shall appear
the leading editors Of the United States
telling the story Of their struggles, their
[ Victories, their mistakes. how they worked
and what they found out to be the best
way Of working. There will be strong
mon who will climb up without such aid
into editorial power and efficiency. SO dc
mon climb up to success in other bran ches
bv sheer grit. But II we want learned insti.
tutions to make lawyers and artists and doc
tors and ministers, We much more need
learned institutions to make editors, wh1
occupy u position of influence hundredfold
greater. do not put the truth too strongl,
Whsn say the most potent influence fol-
good on earth = Q good editor and the mos
poeont indusnee for svl1 3 bad onsh Thu