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The Abuse of the Press
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lies, directed to bias the judgment and inflame the passions of the people. These falsehoods could not be corrected by those who knew the truth, because the only avenues of effective correction were the columns of the very press which circulated the falsehoods, and they were closed. Where some slight pretence of 'hearing the other side' was maintained, as, for instance, by The Daily News, the familiar methods of editorial footnotes, precluding contradiction, or of always awarding a 'last word' to the Jingo, who used his opportunity to add new falsehood, were persistently employed.

What is at stake here is nothing less than the credit of printed matter. Even among the educated classes there survives a certain tendency to believe printed statements of fact in a newspaper or a book; and uneducated persons are far more profoundly impressed by the truth and the importance of printed than of spoken words. As large new masses of the population are brought within the range of the newspaper or the book, the aggregate intellectual credit of the press has expanded, until it represents a vast sum. This intellectual credit may either be economized and maintained by careful and accurate use of the press, or it may be squandered. The war-press,

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