SPECIAL ARTICLE. CANUTES AND THE PRESS.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 18900, 15 January 1927, Page 13

SPECIAL ARTICLE. CANUTES AND THE PRESS.

froffl the imperial that half-Hving • are anxious . flu** 1 *" . ,_ ed they are anxious HP**.- amtinent to continent. strange fe? Tuning of the nrst '•21% might weU have been *» ""J lugubrious sigh of ''fSUpirit over the departure of the Middle Ages; and and fluttering of wireless : STS »<"ißg P ictureS ™ 7 > S T • fZ ience, be mistaken for the the Industrial Revolution. h." »ew things that SSTwith, until those things, play iffiL New things had come into 5« b the mid-fifteenth century, and §L'fciiitutlcras were not slow to Xnftiab The earlv association of ' JEr'»t of printing with a financier mto the oolnouß name of Faust was jjEL by the eager welcome accorded L' 1 byJhe Pope and by the >fl|si»<Jh«Kh, a welcomo from which 'VISi*H of the Chapel of our own ;' , '^ JJ , w lj'to'bo descended. It is =lf&tW''the J&zarin Bible, in tho four centuries, has f iffil»P' tt9 control of a Prince of IfSwrni vho dominated tho world ' JBSkW *° the samo ' But tJl ° /iSlipf at set a new and ter * ' JfElfl'js notion, a force destined »$HEgi orientation of the human tjjMKßjKtoflMen no incongruity in 'l^Sffiin| jn the earliest days, reIjfflflyMMibilitieß of the Press. niiP l the great library in office, and sculp- . Wsfmfiy Ann * were the words iMßJß|fl|jSi. patrnm opera reatitunft to to '' He was 'mofllfcffle 1 of the chapel, fKjgjgSpian fathers round mm his great edition of .JffljH Slft'even before these halimi SroßixtusTv". bad a tremor ;->JE| Sr£'l«»i le«9 than a quar:mM§ma7 after Gutenberg gave iffflPPfiha world, accorded poiver |!HBfjWveroty of Cologne to ffHJlfpptert and* readers of the Wmt rtgttlition of. printed books by ißit&oHo Charth was thl? tot round l&uffWgl* thati»by 4»smeaju"end-|Wl,°ioreraa-tbt appoJßimeniof »'censor dominion? k 1515, > A swift { mmt to the mvteVfrfaW*- 06 *- Wrmi-wlere LuthIshed 'a printing press m&M \oika into !!flj> JnajilsHion, ever |W and mindful of f tarajr'well, was tfi npversal censort tap Uplvertitiea of »hd' Paris drew up ippj»/5i'1559 came i-1156| and yet conleil of Trent. Some » wad at all, some, some condemned as itrine. THe Triden-" 1 in 1564, and this Congregation of the I in new form in 'again In 1506 with j thorough Spanish aqt X6ty far wrong U project of licensie Inquisition, was Prelates, and hath Presbyters." The I it did not stay at ? entrails of many ; with a .violation eouia be offered to jrows frantic when g forms which per*J«. "It may be h words drive the abyss, of obscenity, o Inquisition had sedming-imposaible, ot> learning and the whole of the lea. It was a tril solidarity of the to an effort' of the which was in Pact rm and by the high ,' that the Society But freedom was I of man, through part of the known ntent to be spoon's. The first round >d tho censors had 4 Bound, was fought in Enclel, the Archbishop iet the field by his ririch declared that i and approved by Oxford and Cambishop for the time w and sold to such | fifteenth contnry censorship of manuSB strict as anyeville was to ordain books. It is strange urn and rend ArunMartin V. t whose action of the Archonstitutions foreran some half-century; illy became acute ige when it might ; the Tndor Age, inting in hand, but iccessor. The Detmber of July 11th, »tin& is an amazpurports to follow nances for the betregulating of printnne 23rd, 1586; but (significantly . de«c« triaen, and beene 4 malice of wicked ■i to tho prejudice oi » Übelloa,, edition., ,hw« been unduly W ft papers without ««» of the peace of f rules into force engtheaed the sysnooksbnt limited «t«r Printers to Sng's, Printers and i'for the universi- *> » speech of Mr 16 liberty of un'the Parliament of >;1644. Itnatur- * the name of any nwejeary herß to PPjece, but one quo"'•iaw Milton knew

as well as anyone that books can be malefactors.

I deny not, but that it is of greatest; concernment in the Church and Commonwealth to have a vigilant eye how Books demean themselves as well as men; and thereafter to confine, imprison, and do sharpest justice on them as malefactors: for Books are not absolutely dead things, but do" Contain a potency of life in them to be as active as that soul was whose progeny they are, nay they do preserve as in a- vial .the pawst efficacy and extraction of that living intellect that bred them. I know they are as lively and as vigorously productive as those a onions Dragon's teeth; and being sown up sna down, may chance to spring up armed men.

That was the case for licensers. Quiroga himself could have said no more. Milton's answer to his argument is that there is an essential- distinction between a good book and a bad.

■Who kills n Man kills a reasonable creature, God's Image; but he who destroys a good Book, kills reason itself, kills the Imago of God, as it were in the eye. Many a man lives a burden to the earth; but a good book is the precious life-blood of a Master-spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life.

Milton's argument is that there must be someone to distinguish between a good book and a bad book. He did not admit that the Master of the Holy Palace was that person; he did not admit that either a Prelate or a Presbyter was that person. The remedy for bad books was a simple one. The printer's and author's names must be registered; and, if they were not registered and the book were found mischievous and libellous, then "the fire and the executioner will be the timeliest and the most effectual remedy that man's prevention can use." The signed book Milton left to the mercy of the ordinary law. This is practically the solution that eventually came in England. But Milton's publisher did not appear on his title page.

If Milton won in an intellectual and spiritual sense a lasting victory, the forces of reaction in 1662 won the second round: a victory that had at any rate a desolating effect on education, a victory that played some part in tho darkness that lay over universities and schools for, at any rate, half a century in England. The Press Act of 1662 was as thorough a thing as any hopeful Canute could desire in the way of ordering back the tide. It may be doubted if the censorship had all the effects that were intended in the days of the Star Chamber of Charles I. or of Cromwell's Council of State; but there was no manner of doubt of the efficiency of the revived machinery for the control of tho. Press. The licensees had the nation by the throat. No unpleasing word could bo uttered. Edward Arber shows us that they "gagged the London Press their as it has never been gagged before or since." That, great Victorian editor did not foreseo what could bo done in the way of gagging in the future. But certainly the policyof thoroughness in the control of the Press had never before been equalled. Not only was the censorship fierce,, not only had all new books to be licensed, but the importation, of foreign books was strictly controlled, while printers and.presses were.brought within modest limits. It was a deliberate experiment. The, Act was for two years only, .but it was renewed until 1679 and was then again imposed in 1685. The iron policy was continued until 1694 and then dropped like a hot brick. A public that was quite content with tyranny and a blight on.all'noble thought was not content with the fetters that it placed on a remunerative trade and occupation. The spiritual side of the business played no part in the new policy.- The Licensing Act was not businesslike, and it came to an end. as.was perhaps fitting in the eyes of the Time-Spirit. The third round had been won by a nation of shopkeepers. Fourth Bound Fought in France.. Tho fourth round was fought in France, where the'Sorbonne had.' given considerable, assistance:to."the/Vatican in the battles that won the first round for the forces of reformed reaction. The French Press in the days immediately before the elections for the States General in 1789 had an orgy of publication that recalls the vast activities of' the printing press in tho days of Erasmus. All parties. plunged into a bloodless pamphletical war; and a perfectly free Press published more nonsense, more bitterness, more hysteria-of all sorts than has ever before or since been crowded into the same limits of time and place. Necker could do nothing,,and the King was quito content. Possibly it was thought that it was a good thing to let off. steam; but there were considerable reserves of steam, sufficient in fact to bloV the body-politic to atoms after all that could be saidin print had been said. There was some theoretical restraint; but after the end of July all restraint vanished, and_ newspapers suddenly came into existence, 'including Marat's "Friend of the People," which prepared the way for a ■ bloody revolution. If the Restoration in England provides'an amazing. spectacle of : the successful repression of the Press, the Revolution in France supplies an even more striking, picture. of licentious liberty. In the one case necessary commonsohse redressed the violence after thirty years of tryanny; in-.the later case it led. to perhaps-the most striking reaction in the history of literature, the'theatre, and the Press. Napoleon, with his logical Latin mind, not only gagged the newspapers, but made-the French.world quite content to have done with the orgies of the printed and tho written word. From April sth, .1800, while the censor of tho theatres worked heartily, the Ministry of Police supervised not only the French newspapers but all publications. Yet six years of experience showedi that further regulation of theatres was necessary, at any rate to the-cautious mind of. the great Emperor. The wholo country was divided into theatrical provinces, and'the players were watched with.the microscope of the finest system of police known to history. But the additional checks on publication wore delayed till the spring of 1810. There was a fixed number of licensed printers for the wholo country. London a century and a half earlier had been allowed twenty printers. Teeming post-Revolution Paris was allowed sixty. The booksellers were also licensed, and also were required to.swear an oath, which no doubt they readily swore. Professor Pariset tells us that before being printed, every work had to be submitted to the General Censorship, tad, in case of appeal, to the Minister of the Intenor, but, even after permission given, tto. general police and the prefects could suspend publication. The B eventy shown by tho General Censorship and the P<*«"l dealing with intellectual activity was almost incredible. But the hands-of Napoleon did not neglect the newspapers, for which,-be-fore 1810, official editors were provided After 1810 each department was allowed one newspaper only, under the control of the prefect. After October, 181U, there were only four newspapers leit in Paris. Finally the Decree of September 17th, 1811, confiscated all the Parisian papers. "From that moment the Press may be said to have ceased to exist. Political news was only published at rare intervals, and only with the Go\ernment's consent; and such news was often false." The Fifth Bound Begins. The fifth and as yet unfinished round of the great contest between the. printing press and the forces of reaction may be said to have begun immediately after Waterloo and to have played a part in the large struggle for freedom in that epoch of revolutions that'has not yet found its end. In France the wavering contest lasted for half a'century. Freedom and repression alternated as it suited the policy of successive rulers In 1819 the Press was free; but that tree-

dom failed before the combined demands of the monarchy, the aristocracy, and the Church; yet the attempt in 1826 to reintroduce the methods of Napoleon failed. Napoleon 111. employed a policy that gave the form and not the fact of freedom; but by the opening of 1868 the victory was won, and Henri Eochefort used the new freedom with terrible effect. The Press laws were weapons that had broken in the hands of the armies of reaction. But the Press laws in France up to 1868 were only one phase of the attempts of dictators in the modern world to oppose the growth of knowledge and freedom. The principle of censorship has terrible achievements to record in modern times; and tho belief in its efficiency does not tend to die, despite successive failures in the past five centuries. It is perhaps not surprising that the belief survives in full force in Eussia, since for a century the repression of the Press has been singularly effective in that unhappy country and has had results in prolonging the ignorance of a multitudinous people that' have closed the window in the west that Peter tho Great opened. The censorship of books and newspapers from 1828 to 1861 reached what one can only call insane dimensions. The period of emancipation seemed to prophesy better things; but the enlightened Press law of 1865 foreran the sternest political repression. In defiance of tho law the executive in 1868 forbade the sale of newspapers in the streets, and the order bocame permanent; while in 1879 it took power to forbid newspapers to print advertisements, and so struck at the means of production almost as effectively as if the executive had confiscated the produce of the paper mills or locked out all tho .printers. Yet even this process, of repression was futile for its immediate purpose, since revolutionary prints poured in from foreign presses. Fate seemed to side with the repressors; for, as Alexander 11. was moving into a more liberal atmosphere, his murder in 1881 introduced a now era of repression that found its philosophy and its •justification in the iron views of that personification of reaction Pobyedonostseff. 'A' quarter of a century later there came an orgy of freedom, following the battle, of Mukden, amid the upgrowth, of constitutional projects. The scene was an ominous reminder of the Press orgies in 1789; and tile inevitable reaction came. To-day after a decade of the intolerable miseries of war and revolution Eussia is back in the darkness of bureaucratic control of the printing press. Nor in that respect does Eussia stand alone. The various dicta-, tors in the Mediterranean basin, who m their various ways ' have calmed the seething waters that have followed the. tempest of the Great War, have not hesitated and do not hesitate to control the Press in a fashion that has shocked the liberalism of a critical world. An Uncertain Future. It is, no doubt, difiicult to prognosticate the course of events in the residue of the sixth century since Archbishop Arundel began the policy of stamping" out by force the publicity of the written or the spoken work; but in one' sense it is not difiicult. Books and publications generally are very like men; and, if they do not bear the name of their authors or their publishers, they should be treated as men and should, if they are malefactors —that is to say, if they infringe the common law of the realm or Commonwealth —be punished by suppression. If, on the other hand, the author and the publisher give their names, then the common law. can deal with their persons as well as their books if the books infringe the common law. In such a case there is no need of censorship, if the common law is administered with common sense. The produce of the Press censors itself, if the common law is reasonable, swift, immutable. The task of prognostication, therefore, merely consists in the division of the nations into two the group that relegates the emanations of the Press ~ to the equitable dealings of a common law, and the group that has, willingly or unwillingly, surrendered its personality into the hands of a Tyrannus. The ordered freedom of the Press will become the measure of complete nation-, hood. A nation that has a Press shackled by administrative tyranny will, in times to come) be a nation in childhood or in second childhood, a nation that is not sui juris, a nation that is suffering from the pangs of growth or the miseries of senile dementia. That ia not difficult to prognosticate. What is difficult to prognosticate is the rate at which modern civilised nations will emerge from barbarism into that suave region that prescient men have called Humanitas