Good news

“ And nations to nations send good news: a race of slaves is set free; a war has ended; shiploads of grain have been sent to the starving; a good man has been made ruler; these are good tidings—gospels."
After dwelling on this first, simplest idea of the word, until every one of her hearers had begun to think vividly of all the good tidings journeying in words back and forth between heart and heart, continent and continent, she spoke of the good news which nature tells without words. ”

“ Therefore we thank the Great Spirit, who has preserved you from dangers, that would have prevented our hearing the good news you have come to bring us. And when filled with good news, how is it possible that disasters should befall you on the way? ”

“ It is good news, worthy of all acceptation; and yet not too good to be true, for it is a faithful saying. ”

“ Seen in the light of that—seen in the light of Christ’s cross and what it tells us, all is clear, and all is bright, and all is full of good news—at least to those who are humble and contrite, crushed down by sorrow, and by the feeling of their own infirmities. ”

“ This reminds me of another royal message from the King of kings which is also encircling the world and telling the good news wherever man is willing to hear it. "He that hath an ear let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the Churches." ”

“ For some centuries we have been trying to make people good with lawyers and juries and ballot boxes. We are now to try, at last, religion or gospel or news or ideals—practical, shrewd aimed ideals, that is, news to a man about himself or news about the man from the man himself to us. In everything a man does he is expressing to us this news about himself, and about his world, and about his God. We are all telling news about the world and about ourselves all the time and we are all in a position for news all the time. ”

“ It is such good news, such blessed news, and yet such awful news, that we are afraid to believe it fully. That the Almighty God should be so near us, sinful men; that we, in spite of all our sins, should live, and move, and have our being in God. ”

“ Ask why your stories have been changed so your next story will be better through avoidance of the same mistake.
Never be afraid to ask anybody anything.
The mainspring of a good newspaper man is a wholesome curiosity.
The essentials of newspaper writing are accuracy and simplicity. The newspaper is no place for fine writing. Simplicity means directness and conciseness in telling the story as well as an avoidance of hifalutin phrases, obsolete words and involved sentences. ”

“ Oh, my friends, take these words to yourselves; and trust in that good Father in heaven, whose love sent you into this world, and gave you the priceless blessing of life; whose love sent his Son to show you the pattern of life, and to redeem you freely from all your sins; whose love sends his Spirit to give you the power of leading the everlasting life, and will raise you up again, body and soul, to that same everlasting life after death. Trust him, for he is your Father. Whatever else he is, he is that. He has bid you call him that, and he will hear you. ”

“ And therefore perhaps it is a good thing for us that Trinity Sunday comes always in the sweet spring time, when all nature is breaking out into new life, when leaves are budding, flowers blossoming, birds building, and countless insects springing up to their short and happy life. ”

“ You praise a person because he is praiseworthy, noble, and admirable. You magnify a person—that is, speak of him to every one, and everywhere, in the highest terms—because you think that every one ought to know how good and great he is. And, therefore, when the hymn says, ‘Bless God, praise him, and magnify him for ever,’ it does not merely confess God’s power. No. It confesses, too, God’s wisdom, goodness, beauty, love, and calls on all heaven and earth to admire him, the alone admirable, and adore him, the alone adorable. ”

“ Blessed thought, that after all our neighbours are our brothers, and that if we remember that steadily, and treat them as brothers now, they will recollect it too some day, and treat us as brothers in return. Blessed thought, that there is in the heart of every man a spark of God’s light, a grain of God’s justice, which may grow up in him hereafter, and bear good fruit to eternal life.
Yes; it is a pleasant thing to find men better than we fancied them. A pleasant thing; for first, it makes us love them the more, and there is nothing so pleasant as loving. ”

“ Not the love which is satisfied with sitting still and enjoying itself, as long as nothing puts it out, and turns its love to anger—what we call mere good nature and good temper; not that, not that, my friends: but love which will dare, and do, and yearn, and mourn; love which cannot rest; love which sacrifices itself; love which will suffer, love which will die, for what it loves;—such love as a father has, who perishes himself to save his drowning child. ”

“ The more you give up your hearts to such good feelings, the more you will understand of God; the more nobleness there is in you, the more you will see God’s nobleness, God’s justice, God’s love, God’s true glory. The more you become like God’s Son, the more you will understand how God can stoop to call himself your Father; and the more you will understand what a Father, what a perfect Father God is. ”

“ The account of the event itself demands spirited narrative and description that portrays not only the scenes but the spirit of the occasion. The contrast between the emotions of the victors and those of the vanquished may be used to good advantage. ”

“ I believe that clear thinking and clear statement, accuracy and fairness are fundamental to good journalism.
I believe that a journalist should write only what he holds in his heart to be true.
I believe that suppression of the news for any consideration other than the welfare of society is indefensible.
I believe that no one should write as a journalist what he would not say as a gentleman; that bribery by one's own pocketbook is as much to be avoided as bribery by the pocketbook of another ”

“ You are still God’s child, still an immortal soul: you may rise yet, and fight a good fight yet, and conquer yet, and be a man once more, after the likeness of God who made you, and Christ who died for you!’ Oh, why crush that voice in any heart? ”

“ And we who are coming to the holy communion this day—let us ask ourselves, What do we want there? Do we want to be made good men, true, honest, just? Do we want to be saved from our sins? or merely from the punishment of them after we die? Do we want to be made sharers in that everlasting righteousness of Christ, which sustains him, and sustains the whole world too, and prevents it from becoming a cage of wild beasts, tearing each other to pieces by war and oppression, falsehood and injustice? ”

“ And with the blood of his cross was bridged over for ever the gulf between God and man, and the gulf between man and man.
Good Friday showed that there was sympathy, there was fellow-feeling between God and man; that God would do all for man, endure all for man; that God so desired to make man like God, that he would stoop to be made like man. There was nothing God would not do to justify himself to man, to show men that he did care for them, that he did love the creatures whom he had made. Yes; God had not forgotten man; God had not made man in vain. ”

“ Then these simple men looked up to the heaven above, and round on the earth beneath, and asked, Who is it who is calling for us? Who is it we ought to obey and please; who gives us good things? Who may hurt us if we make him angry?
Then the first thing they saw was the sun. What more beautiful than the sun? What more beneficent? From the sun came light and heat, the growth of all living things, ay, the growth of life itself. ”

“ Did you never see, that all good men show their goodness in the same way, by doing the same kind of good actions? Let them be English or French, black or white, if they be good, there is the same honesty, the same truthfulness, the same love, the same mercy in all; and what is right and good for you and me, now and here, is right and good for every man, everywhere, and at all times for ever. Surely, surely, what is noble, and loveable, and admirable now, was so five thousand years ago, and will be five thousand years hence. ”

“ I believe that advertising, news and editorial columns should alike serve the best interests of the readers; that a single standard of helpful truth and clearness should prevail for all; that the supreme test of good journalism is the measure of its public service.
I believe that the journalism which succeeds best—and best deserves success—fears God and honors man; is stoutly independent, unmoved by pride of opinion or greed of power; constructive, tolerant, but never careless; self controlled, patient; always respectful of its readers, but always unafraid; is quickly indignant at injustice ”

“ How could the gods love men? And then men had a sense of sin; they felt they were doing wrong. Surely the gods hated them for doing wrong. Surely all the sorrows and troubles which came on them were punishments for doing wrong. How miserable they were! But the gods sat happy up in heaven, and cared not for them. Or, if the gods did care, they cared only for special favourites. If any man was very good, or strong, or handsome, or clever, or rich, or prosperous, the gods cared for him—he was a favourite. ”

“ A good reporter usually plans his story, lead and details in his head on his way to the office.
NEVER GUESS.
KNOW WHAT YOU ARE WRITING ABOUT.
When you turn in a story KNOW that everything in that story is true—and if you feel there is a statement you can not prove, call your city editor's attention to it.
To color or fake a story is not newspaper work—it is prostitution of the profession of journalism.
Be sure of your sources of information. Never take anything for granted—find out for yourself. ”

“ And the boundless sea is the great ocean of time—of God’s created universe, above which his Spirit broods over, perfect in love, and wisdom, and almighty power, as at the beginning, moving above the face of the waters of time, giving life to all things, for ever blessing, and for ever blest. ”

“ What would the world become like this moment if every man loved his neighbour as himself, thought of his neighbour as much as he thinks of himself? Would it not become heaven on earth at once? There would be no need then for soldiers and policemen, lawyers, rates and taxes, my friends, and all the expensive and heavy machinery which is now needed to force people into keeping something of God’s law. Ay, there would be no need of sermons, preachers and prophets to tell men of God’s law, and warn them of the misery of breaking it. They would keep the law of their own free-will, by love. ”

“ What does half the misery, and all the quarrelling in the world come from, but from people’s loving themselves better than their neighbours? Would children be disobedient and neglectful to their parents, if they did not love themselves better than their parents? Why does a man kill, commit adultery, steal, bear false witness, covet his neighbour’s goods, his neighbour’s custom, his neighbour’s rights, but because he loves his own pleasure or interest better than his neighbour’s, loves himself better than the man whom he wrongs? ”

“ So, my dear friends, it will not be so difficult for you to love God, if you will only begin by loving goodness, which is God’s likeness, and the inspiration of God’s Holy Spirit. For you will be like a man who has long admired a beautiful picture of some one whom he does not know, and at last meets the person for whom the picture was meant—and behold the living face is a thousand times more fair and noble than the painted one. You will be like a child which has been brought up from its birth in a room into which the sun never shone ”

“ It is a mystery which thou must believe and adore. But why he died, thou canst see at the first glance—if thou hast a human heart, and wilt look at what God means thee to look at—Christ upon his cross. He died because he was love—love itself—love boundless, unconquerable, unchangeable—love which inhabits eternity, and therefore could not be hardened or foiled by any sin or rebellion of man, but must love men still; must go out to seek and save them; must dare, suffer any misery, shame, death itself, for their sake; just because it is absolute and perfect love, which inhabits eternity. ”

“ Let us lie down and die; let us bear his heavy hand, if we must bear it, sullenly, desperately: but, as for saying that God is love, or to say that we know the love which God has for us, we say in our hearts, Let the clergyman talk of that; it is his business to speak about it; or comfortable, easy people, who are not watering their pillow with bitter tears all night long. ”

“ Oh, my friends, believe this with your whole heart. Whatever happens to you or to your friends, happens out of the eternal charity of God, who cannot change, who cannot hate, who can be nothing but what he is and was, and ever will be—love. ”

“ Do you feel that you have lost your way in life? Then God himself will show you your way. Are you utterly helpless, worn out, body and soul? Then God’s eternal love is ready and willing to help you up, and revive you. Are you wearied with doubts and terrors? Then God’s eternal light is ready to show you your way; God’s eternal peace ready to give you peace. Do you feel yourself full of sins and faults? Then take heart; for God’s unchangeable will is, to take away those sins and purge you from those faults. ”

“ Ah, when that dark day seems coming on us, and bringing some misery which looks to us beforehand quite unbearable—then how our lip-belief and book-faith is tried, and burnt up in the fire of God, and in the fire of our own proud, angry hearts, too! How we struggle and rage at first at the very thought of the coming misery; and are ready to say, God will not do this! ”