The first notable utterance was by
Mr. Whitelaw Reid, who said the idea and object of the modern daily
newspaper are to collect and give news, with the promptest and best
elucidation and discussion thereof, that is, the selling of these in
the open market; primarily a "merchant of news." Substantially and
distinctly the same ideas were given by William Cullen Bryant, Henry
Watterson, Samuel Bowles, Charles A. Dana, Henry J. Raymond, Horace
White, David G. Croly, Murat Halstead, Frederick Hudson, George
William Curtis, E.L. Godkin, Manton Marble, Parke Godwin, George W.
Smalley, James Gordon Bennett and Horace Greeley. The book is fat with
discussion by these and other eminent newspaper men, as to the
motives, methods and ethics of their profession, disclosing high
ideals and genuine seeking of good for all the world, but the whole of
it at last rests upon primary motives and controlling principles in
nowise different or better or worse than those of the Produce Exchange
and the dry goods district, of Wall Street and Broadway, so that,
taking publications in the lump, it is neither untrue nor ungenerous,
nor, when fully considered, is it surprising, to say that the world's
doing, fact and fancy are collected, reported, discussed, scandalized,
condemned, commended, supported and turned back upon the world as the
publisher's merchandise.
The force and reach of this controlling motive elude the reckoning of
the closest observation and ripest experience, but as somewhat
measuring its strength and pervasiveness hear, and for a moment think,
of these facts and figures.
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