The commonwealth. (Scotland Neck, N.C.) 1896-1929, 1898-03-17

smith received a friend In his mouse,
be (the author) had to sit on the WIN
dow, because there was only one chair
Llnaeus sold his splendid work for
ducat. De Foe, the author OF so many
volumes, died penniless. The learned
Johnson dined behind screen because
his clothes were too shabby to allow
him to dine with the gentlemen who
on the other side of the screen were ap-
plauding his works. And so on down
to the present time literary toll is
great struggle for bread. The world
seems to have grudge against man
who, as they say, gets his living by his
wits, and the day laborer says to the
man of literary toll, "You come down
here and shove plane, and hammer
a shoe last, and break cobblestones,
and earn an honest living as 1 do in
stead of sitting there In idleness scrib-
bling" But there are no harder work
ed men in all the earth than the news
paper people of this country. 1t is not
a matter of hard times; it is charac-
teristic at all times. Men have bet
ter appreciation for that which appeals
to the stomach than for that which ap-
peals to the brain. They have no idea
of the immense financial and intellec-
tual exhaustion of the newspaper press.
Oh, men Of the press, it will be great
help to you if when you get home late
at night tagged out and nervous with
your work you would just kneel down
and commend your case to God, who
has watched all the tatigues of the day
and the night and who has promised
to be your God and the God of your
children forever!
PERVERTED APPETITES.
Another great trial of the newspaper
profession is the diseased appetite for
unhealthy intelligence. You blame the
newspaper press for giving such prom
inence to the murders and scandals.
Do you suppose that SO many papers
would give prominence to these things
If the people did not demand them? If
1 go into the meat market of a foreign
city and / find that the butchers hang
up On the most conspicuous hooks
meat that is tainted, while the meat
that is fresh and savory is put away
without any special care, | come to the
conclusion that the people of that city
love tainted meat. You know very
well that if the great mass of people in
this country get hold OF newspaper
and there are In it no runaway matches,
no broken up families, no defamation
OF men in high position, they pro-
nounce the paper insipid. They say,
lit is shockingly dull tonight" I be-
lieve it is one of the trials of the news
paper press that the people of this
country demand moral slush instead of
healthy and intellectual food. Now
you are respectable man, an intelli-
gent man, and paper comes into your
hand. You open it, and there are
three columns of splendidly written
editorial, recommending some moral
sentiment or evolving some scientific
theory. In the next column there is a
miserable, contemplate divorce case.
Which do you read first? You dip in
to the editorial long enough to say,
"W ell, that's very ably written" and
you read the divorce case from the long
primer type at the top to the nonpareil
type at the bottom, and then you ask
your wife If she has read it. oh, it is
only case of supply and demand
Newspaper men are not fools. They
know what you want, and they give it
to you: l believe that if the church
and the world bought nothing but
pure, honest healthful newspapers
nothing but pure, honest and healthful
newspapers would be published II
you should gather all the editors and
the reporters of this country in one
great convention and ask of them what
kind of paper they would prefer to
publish, believe they would unani-
mously say, "We would prefer to pub
lish an elevating paper" So long as
there is an Ubiquitous demand there
will be an ubiquitous supply. 1 make
no apology for debauched newspaper,
but 1 am saying these things in order
to divide the responsibility between
those who print and those who read.
Another temptation of the newspaper
profession is the great allurement that
surrounds them. Every occupation
and profession has temptations peculiar
to itself, and the newspaper profession
is not an exception. The great demand,
as you know, Is on the nervous force,
and the brain is racked. The blunder-
ing political speech must be read we'll
for the sake of the party, and so the
reporter or the editor has to make 1t
read we'll, although every sentence were
catastrophe to the English language
The reporter must hear all that maud.
BILE speaker who thinks it Is vulgar to