Evening Post. FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 1935. SEVEN DECADES OF SERVICE
ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS. "Ouo of Many Faronta."—Another Icttor on tho samo subject has already been published. "Watchful."—The Inspection was mado ', bccauso tho board is Interested in the effect of new developments on tho employment of labour in tho flax industry; but a • report will not ho available until further lnvcstlgatiens. liave been mado. '"Anti-Humbug."—Tho argument Is best conflned to the first correspondents. "Ago or Reason."—lt would be very difficult to prevent the distribution of this or other printed matter. It Is best to trust tlie people to disregard It.
Today "The Post" invites its readers to look back with it over seventy years of service and public progress—and then to look forward, in the light that the past affords, so that we may go forward with confidence. In the seven decades that are i reviewed in our Jubilee issue, "The Post" and its readers have marched ■on side by side. The "little fishing 'village" of 1865 has become a I modern city, based on a great seaj port, and serving a wide hinterland.. ;The small hand-press paper has 'developed into a journal drawing its news from all quarters of the world | and using all the devices of the modern printer's art for its production. There have been great material achievements in the country and in the newspaper; ' and we cannot i believe that these will yet halt. We i may be unable to perceive what form ! will be taken by die triumphs of the future, whether we are entering now on an era of manufacturing progress, whether the present zeal for a planned economy will survive, or whether we shall spend the next quartercentury in making more ordered use of the gifts which the last quartercentury showered upon us. But this we know: that we must go forward, or fail, for both civilisation and the newspaper must have life, force, and movement, or decay will set in. In looking forward, then, what guidance can we gain from the past? We can guess at mechanical developments as H. G.. Wells and Jules Verne were guessing in the nineteenth century. We shall be on safer ground, however, if we do not try vainly to see the material future, but give closer attention to study of the principles to which we owe what is best and most durable in our civilisation. This applies particularly to the development of the Press. The mechanical achievement of the modern newspaper, were it not so familiar, would be accounted one of the wonders of the twentieth century. From the ends.of the earth news, views, and pictures arc brought together, and distributed to the readers with almost miraculous speed and resource. The newspaper is the magic glass of the Arabian Nights. Yet, as a writer in the Jubilee issue points out, the newspaper does not owe its existence, and progress to mechanism. It has grown to supply one of the most urgent desires of intelligent man—the desire for knowledge of his fellows, of their- actions, and their opinions. If it fails to achieve that purpose, with accuracy, celerity, and .good faith, no mechanical ingenuity can. atone for the failure.
We are reminded of this chief aim by the history of "The Times," which on January I celebrated the completion "of 150 years' publication. In that century and a half "The Times" had seen most of the great developments of newspaper production and had itself inaugurated many. Yet in the leading article of its Anniversary' Number "The Times" ascribed its success not to mechanical progress but to the zeal and good faith displayed in testing and applying what Thomas Barnes, the first independent editor of "The Times," showed to be the sources of power in journalism.
A full, entertaining, and untainted supply of news in every kind, readable, well-informed, and disinterested advocacy of causes on their-merits, a vigilant sense of the common weal directing its powers of discrimination —these were the principles for which "The Times" won the sanction, of experience. . . . Vast as the changes are which have latterly overtaken the organisation , and production of the newspaper, they are "relatively superficial. The finest acquisition of the Press is still the power which men uke Thomas Barnes placed in its hand. From that power derives the public duty of using it to the common good, and with that responsibility come the obligations of a privilege and the restraints and dignities of a profession. Without these the newspaper would still be either the venal and servile implement which it was in the eighteenth century, or the despised, distrusted, and impotent purveyor of sensations. In all the epoch of invention nothing has happened to impair the validity of principles to which alone the newspaper owes its authority and 'its prosperity. In the long run the two are not separate.
"The Post" was established and guided in its early years by men who held firmly and faithfully these great principles of British journalism. The tradition of independence, service, and good faith has guided it through years of difficulty and years of prosperity. To this tradition, interpreted in a vigilant and progressive spirit, "The Post" owes its ability to serve the public.
For the public welfare also a firm hold on principles is equally important if. progress and civilisation are not to be a great delusion. In the history of the city and New Zealand which is traced in our special issue there is a record of a mai-vellous
advance. But guiding this advance there have been the grand principles of integrity and good faith and the virtues of industry, courage, and resourcefulness. To them the-coun-try owes what it has been able to i grasp and retain of material progress. We are told that the times are changing, that new methods must be devised to meet new conditions. There is even a spirit abroad which would deride the old virtues as oldfashioned. But this is the most deceptive sophistry. Steadfast adherence to principles is essential.for the renewal of the quietness and confidence which are still the sure foundation of national as well as individual strength.' If the country is to recover permanently its material prosperity, it must first regain the hold, which the depression has slackened, upon those principles which are the basis of order and by the application of which civilisation is distinguished from chaos.
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Bibliographic details
Evening Post, Volume CXIX, Issue 33, 8 February 1935, Page 2
Word Count
1,062Evening Post. FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 1935. SEVEN DECADES OF SERVICE Evening Post, Volume CXIX, Issue 33, 8 February 1935, Page 2
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