we happen not to have witnessed, certain other persons whom we happen not
to have known. And such is indubitably the case; for romance, interest,
dwell not in the thing seen, but in the eye of the beholder. And so the
earth is a dull planet--for the majority.

Yet there are exceptions: the most numerous exceptions are lovers and
journalists. A lover is one who deludes himself; a journalist is one who
deludes himself and other people. The born journalist comes into the world
with the fixed notion that nothing under the sun is uninteresting. He
says: "I cannot pass along the street, or cut my finger, or marry, or
catch a cold or a fish, or go to church, or perform any act whatever,
without being impressed anew by the _interestingness_ of mundane
phenomena, and without experiencing a desire to share this impression with
my fellow-creatures." His notions about the qualities of mundane
phenomena, are, as the majority knows too well, a pathetic, gigantic
fallacy, but to him they are real, and he is so possessed by them that he
must continually be striving to impart them to the public at large. If he
can compel the public, in spite of its instincts, to share his delusions
even partially, even for an hour, then he has reached success and he is in
the way to grow rich and happy.

* * * * *

We come to the secret significance of journalism:--

Life (says the public) is dull. But good newspapers are a report of life,
and good newspapers are not dull.

Therefore, journalism is an art: it is the art of lending to people and
events intrinsically dull an interest which does not properly belong to