ard literature of an enormous class,
who must find their reading in a newspaper, or they will not
read at all,--so long must its odium be upon the country's
head, and so long must the evil it works be plainly visible
in the Republic.

"To those who are accustomed to the leading English
journals, or to the respectable journals of the Continent of
Europe, to those who are accustomed to anything else in
print and paper, it would be impossible, without an amount
of extract for which I have neither space nor inclination,
to convey an adequate idea of this frightful engine in
America. But if any man desire confirmation of my statement
on this head, let him repair to any place in this city of
London where scattered numbers of these publications are to
be found, and there let him form his own opinion."

From a note appended to this passage, we infer that the newspaper
which weighed upon the author's mind when he wrote it was the New York
Herald. The direct cause, however, of the general license of the press
at that time, was not the Herald's bad example, but Andrew Jackson's
debauching influence. The same man who found the government pure, and
left it corrupt, made the press the organ of his own malignant
passions by bestowing high office upon the editors who lied most
recklessly about his opponents. In 1843 the press had scarcely begun
to recover from this hateful influence, and was still the merest tool
of politicians. The Herald, in fact, by demonstrating that a newspaper
can flourish in the United States without any aid from politicians,
has brought us nearer the time when no newspaper of any importance
will be subject to party, which has been the principal cause of the
indecencies of the press.

The future is bright before the journalists of America. The close of
the war, by increasing their income and reducing their expenses, has
renewed the youth of several of our leading journals, and given them a
better opportunity than they have ever had before. The great error of
the publishers of profitable journals hitherto has been the wretched
compensation paid to writers and reporters. To this hour there is but
one individual connected with the daily press of New York, not a
proprietor, who receives a salary sufficient to keep a tolerable house
and bring up a family respectably and comfortably; and if any one
would find that individual, he must look for hi