Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1911-04-11
PIT "A N D PR ESS

p UL PIT "A
The following article by DR.. George p Eck1nan, pas
tor Of ST. Paurs Methodist Episcopal church Of New
York appeared in the Editor and Publisher:
Vicious literature may have slain it's thousands, but
good literature has redeemed it's tens Of thousands The
most influential literary product of day is the news
paper and whoever pronounces impartial Judgment up
on its moral quality must acknowledge that with some
notorious and fragrant exceptions which will diminish
in number as society rises in dignity newspapers are
to be reckoned among the most potent forces making
for Righteousness in modern times The pulpit may well
look upon the press its most important and helpful
ally and the press may with equal proprety regard the
pulpit as an institution Of society deserving Of it's most
cordial respect and its warmest support
In the strctest sense there be such thing as
secular newspaper. Religion fundamental to hui
man life and enters fully into all the occupations
of mankind that it is impossible for anything which
ministers constantly to human needs as does the
newspaper to divest itself of moral and religious
aspects though it's promoters should wish this to
be done. The newspaper can be protane, but IL can
never be secular 1t be rregious but it can never
be unreligous. Consider the three conspicuous func-
tons of the newspaper and observe the proof OF this
It record Of the worlds activities exponent OF
the worlds thought, and an advocate of the worlds
policies In other words it tells what people doing,
what they thinking, and what they ought to do and
think In not one of these functions is it possible to
avoid moral and religious considerations The narrative
of current events is simply the marking Of the sue
cessive stages in the evolution Of human society The
devot man detects herein the tokens of the presence of
God in the history Of the world The same is true with
regard to public opinion, which is both stated and
moulded by the newspaper. The press is in sense
weather vane It shows the drift and direction Of pop
uar thought and feeling indicates either the moral
and intellectual progress the temporary decline Of
society All public questions in their last analysis are
religious questions They make their ultimate appeal
to the conscences Of They judged as right or
wrong by the moral Of the people For this rea-
son the newspaper must take religious complexion
even when stouty refuses to discuss religious topics
The responsibilities of the press measured by the
influence which it exerts upon the public mind and its
power in this direction can hardly be stated in terms
too large Said Thomas Carlyle long years ago, The
journalists are now the true kings and clergy Hence
forth historians unless they FOOLS must write not
Of Bourbon dynastes and Tudors and Hapsburgs; but
Of stamped broad-sheet dynasties ,and quite
cessive Names according this or the other able or
combination Of able editors, gains the worlds ears.
Wendell Phillips was accustomed to say that the press
virtually furnished the entire reading matter of the
masses to whom it stood literature church and col
eqe and who regarded the information and instruction