The Topeka state journal., 1900-03-12
DISCUSSES NEWSPAPERS.
DR.. Fisk Says Their influence Is In
tensely Moral.

DR.. Fisk Says Their Influence Is In
tensely Moral.
DR.. D. NJ. Fisk, pastor of the First
Congregational church, took for the
subject of his Sunday morning ser
mon ''Shau the Press be a Redemption
or Frankly Pagan"
DR.. Fisk said: 1.-The newspaper is a
part of social service. a part of the
answer of human ability to human
| need, therefore it comes under the
common law of all social service.
What is the law? From the highest
philosophical standpoint, let alone
Christian, all social service should be
redemptive. So far as we know any
thing Of God he has always been at
work on man. All men crowned with
honors have become eminent from the
contributions they have made to men.
Anything less than a fraternal con-
tributOry touch on a brother must be
classed under the category of the GRIM
inal. the anti-social. the felonious. All
attitudes toward man, all contacts on
man, ought to contribute to the COM
pletiOn of society. Every craftsman
serves his neighbor by something that
repays what he receives in exchange
from his neighbor. Legitimate trade is
never plunder, but mutual advantage.
In short, all work of man is for man,
and is to be judged according to it's
hel2fulness to man. If it lacks jus
tice and helpfulness, let US call it what
Nov if we call good that which
helps a brother, and bad that which
hurts brother, how about the news
papers?
THE newspaper is highly human.
ethical and personal sfOrm of social
service. Back of every vital part of
the newspaper stands a man. The real
paper is never impersonaI The un-
signed leader. the unknown reporter
the press dispatches, the market re-
hook fa ioTo
and illustrations have all had a deciding
brain, an electing will behind them.
Further the men of the press are not
mere expansions of the automatic
mechanism of the linotype, self-inking.
self feeding, self-folding miracles of
mechanism, but human wills, facing
choices, weighing reasons, deciding for
men and sending out their work to
mould men. Now such work is neces-
sarily moral 1t either helps men or it
works men for the money there is in
them.
"a chase as surely locks up human
decisions as type. The matrices are
an ethical consummation of human de-
cisiOn and social attitude as truly as
a pulp.
mo man in the confused labyrinth of
metropolitan daily can manage his
Individual responsibility under some
corporate conscience. He is responsible
for his contribution. He is responsible
also for his acceptance of the condi-
tions under which he works. His duty
is to make his profession a helpful
service to man.
mot merely the editor or dictator. of
the general policy is responsible for the
morals of the paper. The ethical re-
SponSibility follows down to the editor
of the telegraph news, who necessarily
1nJectS his own personality in the de-
cision of what matter goes and what
shall be killed. The amount of display
given 6. scare head, the catchy wording
of subhead. is a moral interpreta-
tiOn, has an educatiVe value and a
moral significance quite as truly as an
editorial article News gatherers, and
the news columns, take on an ethical
attitude and help to form public opin-
ion true or false as much as any part
OF the paper.
Now these decisions are not trifing
or mechanical. The reporter is often
ll1ted IN real power to shape society,
far above the priest in the sanctuary
teacher in the school. For he speaks to
hundreds Of thousands while they speak
to the thousands. He is raised into
prominence by the awful enginery of
modern invention and the social, eco
nonie, need of society represented by
the commercial need OF commercial ad-
vertising.
THE newspaper above all other
agencies is the maker of public opinion
1t is suggestive thought; daybreak
finds city in one state of mind an
hour later, the morning paper having
been read, there is a new estimate of
events, a changed public opinion and
an approval or an Indignation wholly
different from what was Is there any
dignity or moral responsibility in a
power that can so swiftly remake hu-
man thought. The sanctum. sooty
chaos, bedlan, is more intensely moral
than the cloistered silence behind the
chancel rail and it is to be judged OF
men, as the lar of the newspaper mans
own selfhood-which is ever the bar OF
God.
Now shall the newspaper. tingling
to its very finger tips, thus with. moral
significance and social power rise to its
/ true redemptive function to help men
Why not? What would be our esti-
mate of Jesus if He had sold out to the
Devil for the money, and honors, to be
gotten out of the transaction What
would we think of the Apostles or the
world leaders if they had traded off the
Holy Ghost and their open vision for
society for larger bank deposits?
Has the newspaper any dispensation
from the demand that it should help
to perfect man and society?
But what if the publisher, editor or
paragrapher would say we are not in
the redemption business. don't you
think it. We never pose as reformers.
we are not extensively trying to run a
Sunday school for the benefit of a mil
lennium.' What is such a confession but
a plain plea of guilty at the bar OF
social obligation? Is it less than frank