The Penn's Grove record., 1896-03-27
PENIS GROVE. N. j.. FRIDAY. MARCH 27. 1896.

newspaper 10 u muon OF an institution ~
the Bank Of England or Yale College and 10
NOT an enterprise. II you have the afore-
said Agricultural or scientific or religious or
political idea to ventilate, you had better
charge upon the world through the column
already established. It Is folly for any ono
who cannot succeed at anything else to try
~newspaperdom. II you canno climb the
hill back of your house, II Is folly to try the
sides OF the Matterhorn
To publish q newspaper requires the skill,
the precision, the boldness. the vigilance,
the strategy Of o commanderin-chtef. To
edit n newspaper requires that one be q
statesman, an essayist, q geoRrapher, q
statistician, and In acquisition encyclopedias.
To man, to govern, to propel a newspaper
1 until 1t shall be : fixed institution, q Ma
tional fact, demand more qualities than any
business on earth. II you feel like starting
any newspaper, secular or religious, under
stand that you are being threatened with
eoftening Of the brain or lunacy, and, throw.
ing your pocketbook into your wife's lap.
start for some insane asylum before you do
something desperate. Meanwhile, as the
dead newspapers, week by week, are carried
out to the burial, all the living newspapers
give respectful obituary, telling when they
were born and when they died. The best
printers ink should give at least one stick
full OF epitaph. II 1t was q good paper. say,
.tPeace to the ashes" II 1t was Q bad paper,
/ sugges the epitaph written for Francis
Chartreuse: Here continueth to rot the
body OF Francis Chartreuss. who. with an
infexible constsncy and uniformity Of life.
persisted in the practice of every human
vice, excepting prodigality and hypocrisy.
His Unsuitable ayarice exempted him from
the first, his matchless imprudence from the
second" I 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 h fire.
First OF all, newspapers make knowledge
democratic and for them multitude. The pub
lie library Is q haymow so high up that few
can reach It, while the newspaper throws
down the forage to our feet. Public libraries
are the reservoirs where the great floods arc
stored high up and away OF. The newspa-
per Is the tunnel that brings them down to
the pitchers of all the people. The chief use
of great li',raries is to make newspapers out
Of. Great libraries make a few men and wo-
men very wise. Newspapers lift whole Ma
tons intopthe sunlight. Better have ooo,-
000, 900 people moderately intelligent than
100, 900 solons.
A false impression lie abroad that newspa-
per knowledge Is e~phemeral because periodf-
Gals are thrown aside, INT not one out of ten
thousand people files them for futlre refer
ence. Such knowledge, 80 far from being
ephemeral, goes into the very structure OF
the worlds heart and brain and decides the
destiny OF churches and Nations. Knowl-
edge on the shelf Is OF little worth. 1t Is
knowledge afoot, 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
pated. Adams and Hancock and Otis used
togo to the Boston Gazette and compose ar
ticles 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 been
| 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 Ruskinis,
all McIntosh's. all Sydney Smiths,
all 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's
poems, Longfellow's poems, Emerson's po-
ems, Lovelfs poems, Whittier's POEMS, were
once fugitive pieces. You cannot find ten
literary men In Christendom, with strong
| minds and great hearts, but are or have been
| somehow connected with the newspaper
| printing press. While the book will always
have Its place, the newspaper Is more potent.
Because the latter is multitudinous do not
4 conclude it is necessarily superficial. Ifa
| man should from childhood TO old age see
| only his Bible. Webster's Dictionary and his
newspaper. he could be prepared for all the
duties OF this life and all the happiness OF
| The next.
Again, a 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 as we'll as the good, or
\ how shall we know what Is to be reformed,
4 --A-L -1.A w4a.l $1,000
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
I impression that all is fair and right in the
world, and when they go out into 1t they
will be as poorly prepared to struggle with
1t 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 10
made attractive and morality dull, when vice
Ii painted with great headings and good
deeds are put In obscure corners, iniquity
set up In great primer and righteousness in
nonparlel. Sin is loathsome, make 1t loath-
some. Virtue Is beautiful; make 1t beauti.
ful.
1t would work a vast Improvement II all
our papers-religious, political, literary
should for the most part drop their imper-
sonality. This would do better justice to
4 utWSpbQck WIlsbEcs lAA1y VI tno bAAthBcsk
and best writers OF the country live and die
unknown and are denied their lust fame. The
vast public never learns who they are. Most
OF them are on comparatively small income,
and after awhile their hand forgets II cum
ning, and they are without resources, left to
die. Why not, at least, have his initial at
taohed to his most important work. 1t al
ways gave additicnal force to an article
when you occasionally saw added 10 some
significant article in the old New York
Courier and Enquirer j.. W. w.. or In The
Tribune b. G., or in The Herald J. G.. B.. or
In The Times H. J. r.. or In TIE Evening
Post w. Q. D., or In The Evening Express
e. b.
While this arrangement would be a fair
and Just thing for newspaper writers, 1t would
be a defense for the public. 1t is sometimes
true that things damaging to private charac-
ter are said. Who is responsible2 1t is the
eve" of the editorial or reportorlal columns.
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
OF persons have suffered from the imperson-
aiity 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 tiiimitabiy worse
than an injustice lone In private life. Dur
4 Ahh AOoo Va mp - A1t J
which he will be sorry In ten minutes, but a
newspaper injustice has first TO be written,
set up in type, then the proof taken on and
read and corrected, and then for six or ten
hours the presses are busy Running on The
issue, P.enty of time to correct Plenty OF
time TO cool on. Plenty of time 10 repent.
But all that IL hiddea in the i~mpersonality
OF a newspaper. 1t will be a long step for
ward when all Ii changed. aud newspaper
writers get credit for the good and are held
responsible for the evil.
6Another step forward for newapnperdom
will be when in our colleges and uniyer-
stiles we open 2pport unities for preparing
candidates for the editorial chair. We have
In such institutions medical departments,
Law departments. Why not editorial depart
mentsY Do tho legal and heating professions
J demand more culture AMI careful TRAINING
than the editorial or reportorlat professions
I know men may tumble by Whit seems ac-
cldent into Il newspaper office as they ma
tumble into other occupations, but II wonp
be an ipcalcuiabis advantage II those pro
posing : newspaper life had an institution
To which they might 60 to learn the quailh-
cations, the responsibilities, the trials IN.
Temptations, the dangers. the magnticenl
o~pportunities OF newspaper life. Let ther'
he a lecturesbip In which there shall appeal