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Untitled Article
are clearly five twelfths nobler than three and sixpence ; three and sixpence cannot be seen arm in arm with half a crown ; and half a crown considers eighteenpence to be nobody , or a person whom
nobody knows , and not to be talked about on the same day with the * classics * of genteel society . Eighteenpence of course cannot keep 4 low company , ' and must positively * cut' all the penny periodicals . How can truth be written for a penny , or if it can . how can it be good truth ? AH the world knows that the
value of a thing is determined by its selling price . How then can penny truth compare with eighteenpenny truth , and must not the highest of all truth , i . e . of periodical truth , be that which is sold at six shillings ! Penny truth ! Why , who places much faith in the mass of sevenpenny truth which is Rsued daily ; how then is it to be expected that penny truth should make an impression ? There is a notion prevalent amongst some of the good Catholics of Southern America , that that Virgin is the most powerful
whose chapel is the richest . 1 once heard a quarrel between two Gauchos on the subject . ' The Virgin of the stone cross ! ' cried one , what can she do ? Why she has only got tin candlesticks to her shrine ,, whereas our Lady of the Rosary has silver ones . ' A fig for our Lady of the Rosary , ' replied the other , ' our Lady of the stone cross has a diamond band round her hair , would buy our
Lady of the Rosary—chapel , candlesticks , and all ! ' At this unanswerable argument his opponent remained dumb . It is clear that literature is a , commodity to be sold in the market ; can there then be a doubt that that which fetches the highest price must be the best ? Penny truth must doubtless be like a penny whistle , of very inferior quality .
There has been at times a great outcry among authors against the public , as being a blind dull beast of a most ungrateful disposition . This seems to me an unjust charge on the part of those who make it . The fact is , that the highest class of writers , the philosophic writers , are the worst paid for their labours , but they are just the men who complain the least ; they have a higher object than mere gain , and , so they have but a living , they are
content . The imaginative writers are nrincinallv the comnlainers . tent . Ihe imaginative writers are principally the complainers , and who , though in many cases they acquire large sums of money , are very improvident like most other people of imagination , such as painters , players , and musicians . They deem that they are persons of the greatest importance to the welfare of society , and they think that society is bound to support them , whatever
extravagance they may commit . They think that they belong to a gifted class , and that that fact ought to place them beyond ( he necessity of the exercise of prudence . The public think otherwise ; they pay them according to what they think their works are worth , and of a surety there must be two parties to all bargains . They are not badly paid , when they possess talent , as the sales of books evidence , but they think they ought to be paid much higher
Untitled Article
312 On the Morality of Authors .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1833, page 312, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2614/page/24/
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