The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1899-07-14
ID JULY Ia, 1899
THE LIFE OF THE JOURNALIST

We recall that sometime ago we re-
.ferred to the perishable character and
f,,tiIity of journalistic production. That
each day demands new contributions
(which those of the day before are dump
ed into the waste basket n forgotten.
A man might write political editorials
~reeualling the unique and powerful Let
tiers of Junius." or the most extraordi-
mary peter Plymley' papers of Rev.
Sidney Smith. or Dean Swift's~ most
corrosive pamphlets, or BoMingbrooke's
most mastery political tractates OF his
generation, and they would not live IN
the form produced. 1t is strange, out
true. TIC have any lease upon life here
the products of Journalism must be put
into books and into shapes dlfferent
from those of the newspaper. We think
of these things as we read what a gift
ed English Journalist has written. Rev.
s. H.. Reynolds served on the staff of
The Thunderer,' as the London Times
ha been called, for tWenty-tnree
years, writing for it 1000 leading ar
ticles. Among his papers found after
his death was a paragraph that re-
minds us what was said in The Mes
ssenger a year or so since about the
perishableness and futlity of journal
ism-its utter want of staying quail
ties, it's absolute transformers, each ar
ficle perishing with the occasion that
called it forth, being forgotten in the
hour it lis read. Unlike other mental
rroductiveness it has no earthly chances
of survival here, but it may come up
against you in the Great Day-the
Dies Irae. Mr.. Reynolds left at his
death this testimony as to the journal
asst:
He must be content to be counted
AS nothing, as in the present, to be un-
known or set aside, and never to take
rank among the real influences of his
time. His labOrs will be rewarded, but
not as men ordinarily count reward.
He will rave a real pOWer-hlS work
will be deep and lasting, but his name
will be obscure or evanescent. He
will affect the tone of the notion for
which he writes, and will thus be the
indirect cause of it's most noble after
growth. The pillar will not be of his
raising, and will certainly not bear his
name inscribed upon it, but he will be
-tsthe foundation of the whole, the first
"a NtAS N"S ~ f~~
siic sentiment from which 1T has been
raised in seeming independence"
, Take THE Thunderery;@wxpO which
Mr.. Reynolds so long and so faithfully
toiled, and how many of it's men of
rare learning, ability, range of Informal
zion and genius for their particular
work, are now remembered or so much
as named in any cultured or literary
circle? Some of the leading writer's Of
their times have labored most dIligent-
sly, and with consummate mastery, but
! their names are forgotten. 1t is so with
the other hundreds of gifted and schol-
arly journalists who have written for
the reading papers Of the British King
DOM. Unless they have k to other
work in other fields with the pen their
Droductiveness has persisted with the
pens they used. In our own Ian out
of scores of accomplished, versatile, SUI
perbly endowed journalists in the past,
how many are known TO the men, or
even the editors, of his generation!
Who knows of Joseph Gales, Jr.,
George D. Prentice, Henry J. Raymond
Horace Greeley, John M. Daniel, Will
1fam Johnston, (brother of General Jo-
sseph@E. %Johnston), the famous literary
writer on the old National Intelligencer,
and the I'll Segretario' of the ole
Richmo-d Wing, John Hampden Pleas
ANTS. Henry w. Grady and others on
the most influential and rarely gifted
of southern writers for the press? The
other hundreds of men of intellectual
Darts were probably neglected, as the!
Tabored with such assiduity and wer'
forgotten before the grass had begun
to cover their mortal remains. TIL
S,nly reward of journalism, howeve
painfully prosecuted. and with what
ever of devotion, is daily bread, a fain
echo of praise at rare intervals so a.
20 break the painful monotony of cen
sure and complaints and the opposin
eternal iteration of opinion from me-
partially informed OIL ridden by narroy
preildices. The only comfort that eve
comes to the men of the Fable is tn
consciousness of duty performed wit
an eye single to the public welfare, wit
a sincere desire to bless humanity an
TO helm on every good movement start
ed for the uplifting of the race for tn
1amelioration of the sufferers in socle
ty, and for the advancement of true ed
ucation, sound morality, high ideals 9
service, the responsibilities and dutle
of civil life and the Christian Religlo
in it's purity and simplicity. Then dy
ing, 1T is dust to dust and speedy obliV
ion. If the peace with God is neglecte
and preparation for Heaven, then sor
row forever.