56 - 92.
paper give at least a sympathetic understanding of these criti cisms.
It must also be evident that these innumerable errors of state ment are in themselves often of trifling importance , that for the moment some of them may add to the gaiety of the nations,
although others are, to the last degree, irritating and annoying to those concerned . Nearly all of them are quickly forgotten , and the number is extremely small of those that will discomfort the future historian. These he can for the most part quickly detect and either correct or omit them as unnecessary in his reconstruction of the past. He cheerfully agrees with the editor who writes :
“ When we consider that Hudson did not discover New York Bay, but that Verrazzano did ; when we consider that Fulton did not invent the steamboat, buth that consider hesia edid a anaestFitch he pdid nt;twhen rinwe omedidr not nd sBell invent hot invent Shtelephone, n thatthe did invent 'A that thatMorse not the telegraph, that Gutenberg did not invent the printing -press, that Morton did not discover anaesthesia , that Darwin did not
discover evolution , that Shakespeare did not write 'Hamlet,' that Homer did not write the Iliad , that Galileo did not say
'And still it moves,' that Wellington did not say 'Up guards and at them ,' that Washington did not win the battles of the Revolu tion , that Robespierre did not create the Reign of Terror, that Nero was not a monster , that Cleopatra was not beautiful- when we reflect that history is emblazoned with the titles of usurpers
and that truemerit lies unchronicled in the grave, let us address a word or two of apology to that much -berated enemy of the truth , the newspaper. If history, with a thousand years' leisure
at her disposal, cannot find out just who set up a new throne or pulled down an old one, let us forgive the reporter if he misspells the Christian name of the prominent citizen who was thrown
from his automobile at 2:30 A . M .” 30
It must finally be evident that the errors are found, not in
the region reached by libel laws, but in the apparently harmless districts where inaccuracy is of comparatively small moment. But it must also be clear that it is the sum total of these errors
that is magnified out of all due proportion to its importance and that in every community forms the basis of the charge, “ You can 't believe anything you read in the papers.” 20 New York Evening Post, October 8, 1909.
