Page:History of Journalism in the United States.djvu/371

Rh was friendly with the giants of that time. He has loved his profession, he has dignified it, it is as much indebted to him as he is to it. He speaks therefore of the mission of journalism with authority.

"Assuming journalism equally with medicine and law to be a profession," he writes, "it is the only one of the three in which versatility is not a disadvantage. Specialism at the bar or by the bedside leads to perfection and attains results. The great doctor is the great surgeon or the great prescriptionist—he cannot be great in both—and the great lawyer is rarely great, if ever, as counselor and advocate.

"The great editor is by no means the great writer, but he ought to be able to write and must be a judge of writing. The newspaper office is a little kingdom. The able editor needs to know and does know every range of it between the editorial room, the composing room and the pressroom. He must hold well in hand everybody and every function, having risen, as it were, step by step from the ground floor to the roof. He should be levelheaded yet impressionable; sympathetic yet self-possessed; able quickly to sift, detect and discriminate; of varied knowledge, experience and interest; the cackle of the adjacent barnyard the noise of the world to his eager mind and pliant ean Nothing too small for him to tackle, nothing too great, he should keep to the middle of the road and well in rear of the moving columns; loving his art—for such it is—for art's sake; getting his sufficiency, along with its independence, in the public approval and patronage, seeking never anything further for himself. Disinterestedness being the soul of successful journalism, unselfish devotion to the noble purpose in public and private life, he should say to preferment as to bribery, 'Get behind me, Satan.'