Newspaper By-laws

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 27, 1874

Newspaper By-laws.

THE following brief selection on newspaper writing is as good as a volume; and it is not so lengthy but that it may easily find a place in the mind of every one who has any calling to write for the press:

Be brief. This is the age of telegraphs and phonography.
Be pointed. Don’t write all around a subject without hitting it.
State facts, but don’t stop to moralize. It’s a drowsy subject. Let the reader do his own dreaming.
Eschew prefaces. Plunge at once into your subject, like a swimmer into cold water.
If you have written a sentence that you think particularly fine, draw your pen through it. A pet child is always the worst in the family.
Condense. Make sure that you really have an idea, and then record it in the shortest possible terms. We want thoughts in their quintessence.
When your article is completed, strike out nine-tenths of the adjectives.