FROM. THE VIRGINIA PATRIOT.
---
ON NEWSPAPERS.

This folio of four pages, happy work!
Which not even critics criticize; that holds
Inquisitive attention
What is it but a map of busy life;
Its fluctuations, and its vast concerns?
Cowper’s Task, b. 4.

The origin of newspapers is of very ancient date. We can trace something like their institution in the mangled remains of early Roman antiquities. This institution, however, was very imperfect in comparison to that of modern times; the Roman Gazettes contained nothing more than the record of public transactions, and public events, and were of course extremely rare.

There is hardly any other institution in civilized nations which can claim preeminence over newspapers when they are properly conducted. They diffuse over the nation a general knowledge of its political state; and this knowledge will in general be very accurate; for if one give an incorrect statement, another newspaper will shame it into a sense of its most important duty, which is impartial veracity. A man who is most occupied in business, as well as the most indolent reader, who never took up a book since he escaped from the eye of his preceptor, is never deterred from reading the paper. The subjects of ordinary conversation are frequently drawn from it, and every one feels ashamed to be ignorant on common topics. What a fund of entertainment do not the papers afford to the inhabitants of the country? When the papers arrive, expectation and interest are on the wing. - Discussions are discussed over again, opinions canvassed, and rejected or approved; and a thousand collateral reflections introduced. The affairs of the most distant parts of the nation, and events which happened only a few days ago, are universally known, and commented on with that freedom of which a rational being should never be divested. The paper makes its rounds. The aged will read and discuss everything that relates to solid ancient subjects; the young will relish anecdotes, and real or attempted wit. The farmer will accurately examine the state of domestic and foreign markets, and with an oracular visage emit shrewd prophecies concerning the ensuing year. The soldier will devour everything that regards foreign war, and embracing one side of contending parties, relate to his hearers how battles were lost or won, discant on the misarrangement of the troops that were vanquished, and demonstrate how they might have turned the scale of victory.

Of what a source of amusement were the ancients deprived! When Caesar was fighting in Gaul, twenty or thirty days were necessary to convey the news of a victory; and more of a defeat, to the seat of empire. And even then much time elapsed before the people were accurately informed. And of what a source of amusement are not we too deprived! For, what an accurate knowledge should we not have had of the history of past ages, now buried in oblivion forever, if newspapers had been introduced?

This institution, I fear not to assert, is in its most perfect state in this country. I have often wondered at the conduct of the British government on this subject. The diffusion of knowledge is certainly one of the first objects which an enlightened government ought to have in view. And yet Great Britain, by laying a heavy stamp duty on papers, so that few can purchase them, evidently counteracts this diffusion. This is not the case here, and I hope it never will be. It is an indelible stain on any government. But this is a still less grievous evil than the tyranny of the press, which in a greater or less degree exists in the continental nation. Where there is not liberty of the press, the people must always be held in intellectual thraldom. A newspaper will then inform the truths which they must believe, are only truths, because the government wishes them to be so, and are strictly forbidden to believe any other thing, than that, which has received the stamp of government approbation. Liberty of the press is the first and the most holy of our civil rights. Without it what are we? The dupes of tyranny and bigotry: without it all the noble qualities of our nature are blighted, without it, even freedom herself becomes a dangerous light, like the fire that is kindled on an ocean rock, to warn the sea-faring man that its approach is peril, and its contact destruction.

From the number of newspapers in any country, we may form an accurate idea of the literary information of the people. This position is evident at first sight. There are far more newspapers in the U. States than in any country under heaven of equal population. I was astonished the other day at reading an account of their number in the National Intelligencer - and the increase by several hundreds, every year.

AN OBSERVER.

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