Page:The autobiography of a Pennsylvanian.djvu/19

 growing out of erroneous conceptions, that where it seems to be most personal the criticism is based upon something broader than personality and in the main is to be implied from a statement of fact, that the abundant praise has also an underlying foundation, and that both praise and censure are a characteristic application of a persistent standard of conduct and in illustration of a principle, of physical and moral courage or the opposite, and of ethics and the proprieties. At the close of his gubernatorial term, and not before, as an expression of his personal good will, Governor Pennypacker gave a dinner at the Executive Mansion to the newspaper correspondents at Harrisburg. The timing of the courtesy was an expression of his sense of propriety and an indication of the absence of personal feeling in his previous conspicuous effort to bring the publication of newspapers into line under the law with all other commercial activities.

In his notable biography of Governor Pennypacker, printed in 1917, Hampton L. Carson, Esq., the historian of the United States Supreme Court, says of him that he was “a great and a good man.” Mr. Carson's high standing at the bar and as a citizen, his lofty conception of public duty, his long acquaintance with the subject of his Memoir, his intimate knowledge, acquired as Attorney General of Pennsylvania from 1903 to 1907, of Governor Pennypacker's motives, plans and acts, give to the words quoted a weight which they could derive from no other living source.

Towards attaining what is hoped to be a correct presentation of the autobiography in book form, James L. Pennypacker has given much time and indispensable assistance.

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