the controlling interest in the press of America is in the news it
presents; if in France it has been in the criticism it contains; if in England the two-party political organization has given a pre
dominance of interest to party organs; and if in Germany the influence of the government has given opportunity for wide use of the press for propagandist purposes, these varying tendencies
do not diminish the value of the press to the historian, but they do make his use of it infinitely more complicated. His own unconscious tendency may be to judge the press collectively by
the press of the country with which he is most familiar, and to
judge the press of his own country by the conditions under which he personally knows it. But even here he must be on his guard since in no country has the press had a continuous development. In England its utterances, and therefore its influence , were long
restrained by the taxes on knowledge, though even before their removal discriminating critics have found that new
influences
were at work . “ The appearance of The Craftsman at the end of 1726 ," says Percival, " marked the beginning of a new era in the history of journalism . At that time the newspaper press was playing a very minor rôle in politics.” 93 But the Craftsman became the organ of those opposed to Walpole and the Ministry
and it thus made its influence felt although itwas in no sense the influence of an independent press. At the end of the eighteenth century , the time was ripe, Scott
James believes, for the appearance of a new daily , - a literate public was waiting for it, the French Revolution and the career
of Napoleon had stimulated thought, and the age of mechanical invention was making it possible. The Times filled this need , it appealed to the more solid element of the middle class, and " it was the first paper in the world that really organized a uni
versal news service.” It sent Henry Crabb Robinson to Germany and to Spain and later it made him its foreign editor. It had its agents and correspondents everywhere searching for news. “ What The Times said on any important matter was listened to .
all over Europe,” and through The Times " the daily press emerged as an intermediary between those who were really the
93Milton Percival, Political Ballads Illustrating the Administration of Sir RobertWalpole
