Deadly News.
When the newspapers print accounts of a suicide, especially if the self-destroyer used some unusual method or novel poison, an immediate influence producing other suicides can be traced. The suggestion on other minds to perform the same act in the same way appears to be irresistible.
In New South Wales the pharmaceutical board has asked the newspapers not to publish the names of poisons used by suicides, and the newspapers are heeding the request. In 1910 the American Medical Association, moved by the manifest connection between publicity and fresh suicides, urged upon the public press that the details of suicides should be omitted from their accounts.
The newspapers, most of them, insist that it is their duty to furnish the news, regardless of its effect upon the public. This plea would be more plausible if the papers were consistent. When, however, an accident takes place in an advertising department store, the name of that store is carefully omitted from the report of the occurrence. At one time a patient in a Boston hospital died as the result of carelessness on the part of the attendants, but the papers said nothing about it, at the request of a prominent advertiser who was a leading member of the hospital board. Scandals affecting prominent families are often hushed up, though the newspapers know all about them. The papers are easily persuaded to silence for the good of themselves. Where their advertising columns are involved it is not at all their duty to print the whole news.
Often the papers are entirely right in their news suppression; but let them not be hypocritical about it When the public interest is concerned far more deeply and manifestly than in the eases when they suppress the news, let them not plead their duty as newsmongers to divulge all the gruesome particulars. Ah, but in that case the sales are increased, and no advertiser complains! There's where the difference comes in.
It is the duty of every Christian to patronize the newspapers that are conscientious in the matter of what they shall refrain from publishing, as well as in regard to what they publish. As to the duty of Christian merchants to give their advertising patronage to the better class of papers and withhold it from those of hurtful tendencies, that is one of the most obvious, yet one of the most frequently disregarded, phases of Christian ethics.
The Seven-Leagued Boots of Example.
One of Canada's leading statesmen is Sir Wilfred Laurier. He is a Roman Catholic, yet he is anything but a bigot. Indeed, he has won much favor among Protestants because of the genuine catholicity of his mind and the breadth of his sympathies. He has himself told how he came to possess this liberal spirit.
"Up to the age of ten," he says, "I could speak nothing but French, and I hired out with a Scotch farmer in order to learn English. Every morning this good man held family worship, and the different members of the household read in turn a verse of the Bible. In the course of time I was invited to remain with the family while morning service was held, and I had every opportunity of judging of the sterling and consistent character of that good farmer and his family. I must admit that the impressions I there received have remained with me through life, and have undoubtedly influenced me more than I know."
That is the way with all good examples; they walk in their sleep, they go farther than they know. Little did that Scotch farmer and his godly family think that by their simple Christian living they were to influence directly and powerfully the fortunes of a great nation; but such was precisely the result of their regular devotions backed up by honest living.
God often permits good seed to rot in the ground, but He never permits a good example to go to waste. You may have a thousand dollars and no profitable place in which to invest it, but a good example bears high interest from the instant of its execution. He must have swift heels who would catch up with Cresceus on the race track; but not even Cresceus could outspeed a good example. You do not need to look after it any more than, after you have lighted a lamp, you need concern yourself about its sending forth rays. It will take care of itself. Is it not strange that, since each one of us has at his command a force so potent and so manageable, it should be so little used and so sparingly enjoyed?