gures comprehend only the
foreign newspapers, and not the periodicals, some of which are
republished in the United States.

Persons competent to form a correct judgment, do not hesitate to say
that the number of newspapers taken in this country, exceeds that in all
the world beside. So vast an amount of reading matter, voluntarily
sought for and consumed by the people, at a cost of so many millions of
dollars, is one of the most remarkable phenomena of the present age of
wonders, and proves the avidity with which information is received, as
well as the incalculable influence which the press must have on the
public mind. The popular newspaper, issued in immense numbers, is in
truth emphatically an American institution. Nowhere else could an
audience, capable of reading, be found sufficiently numerous to absorb
the issues of our teeming press. It is the offspring and indispensable
accompaniment of universal education and popular representative
government. These could scarcely be maintained without it. Everywhere in
Europe, except perhaps in England, Italy, and Switzerland, the press is
little more than an engine of the government, used chiefly, or only, for
its own political purposes. Here it enjoys absolute freedom, being
responsible only to the laws for any abuse of its high privilege.

This entire freedom promotes unbounded growth in journalism, and gives a
circulation to the remotest cabin in the land. And if the unrestricted
energies of the system produce fruits somewhat wild, not imbued with the
refined flavor of better-cultivated productions, their universal
distribution and bounteous fulness of supply make up somewhat for the
deficiency in quality, and give promise of a future improvement, which
will leave nothing to be desired. If every leaf of the forest were a
sibylline record, and every month of the year should bring round the
deciduous influences of autumn, the leaves that would then "strew the
vales" of our country would give some adequate idea of the immense
shower of these printed missiles which falls every day, every week, and
every month, into the hands of the American people. Do they come as "a
kindly largess to the soil they grew on," or do they scatter mischief
where they fall? Of the power, for good or for evil, of this vast
intellectual agency, there can be no question. But what is the nature of
this influence? How does it affect the character and welfare of the
community in which its unregulated a