96 Political Journab. [CilAP. XXII. 



But to pursue a path calculated to produce these 

 elTects, the conductors of public prints ought to 

 be men of talents, learning, and virtue. Under 

 the guidance of such characters, every Gazette 

 vvoitlil be a source of ?no!Til and potitical instruc- 

 tion, and of course a public blessing. 



On the other handj when an instrument so po- 

 tent is committed to the weak, the ignorant, and 

 the vicious, the most baneful consequences must 

 be anticipated. When men of small talents^ of lit- 

 tle information, and of less virtue, undertake to be 

 (as the editors of public gazettes, however con- 

 temptible their character, may in a degree be 

 considered) the directors of public opinion, what 

 must be the result ? We may expect to see the fri- 

 volities of weakness, the errours and malignity of 

 prejudice, the misrepresentations of party zeal, 

 the most corrupt doctrines in politics and morals, 

 the lacerations of private character, and the pol- 

 luting language of obscenity and impiety, daily 

 issuing from the press, poisoning the principles, 

 and disturbing the repose of society ; giving to 

 the natural an%l salutary collisions of parties the 

 most brutal violence and ferocity ; and at length 

 consuming the best feelings and noblest charities 

 of life in the flame of civil discord. 



In the former part of the eighteenth century, 

 talents and Iea^rniJlg, at least, if not virtue, Vv^ere 

 thought necessary in the conductors of political 

 journals *. Few ventured to intrude into this ar- 



* This has not been, generally, so much the case in Ame- 

 rica as in Europe. From the earliest period too many of their 

 Gazettes have been iu the hands of persons destitute both 

 •f taltats and literature. But, in later times, the number of 



