Reasons for Stopping the Review.
By Editor
If any of our readers wish to stop the paper and hardly know what to offer as a good reason, the following from a subscriber in Bangor, N. Y., may help them. He writes that he wishes his paper discontinued for the following reasons: "1st. I do not believe in the principle of laying all upon the altar, and allowing my fellow sinners to remove the same at pleasure, to the imminent danger of having the sin laid to my charge set forth in 1 Tim. v, 8." This reason speaks for itself. The writer evidently overlooked the fact that all others are required by the spirit of the gospel to have all upon the altar as well as himself. He seems to think the "principle" is for him to lay all that he has upon the altar for his "fellow sinners" to pick off, and have the good of. He is afraid that he shall do more than somebody else, which would be very distressing. We would refer all such cases to Deut. xx, 8. "And the officers shall speak further unto the people, and they shall say, What man is there that is fearful and fainthearted? let him go and return unto his home." His second and last reason was as follows: "2nd. The paper is furnished at an exorbitant price, under the pretext of furnishing the poor gratis, thereby taking advantage of those who cannot do without it, to forcibly sieze upon their possessions for common distribution, instead of scripturally waiting for them to bring their offering, and lay it at the apostle's feet." In reply to this, it will only be necessary to state a few facts. At the price at which the paper is now published, it would scarcely more than support itself if all to whom it is sent should pay the full subscription price. But there are on the poor and free list two hundred and forty, besides many to whom the paper is sent on trial for a time. Now how is this expense to be met? Not from the regular subscriptions; for what we receive on this account does not cover it; and it is not the design of the publishers to impose this burden upon the subscribers of the paper, further than they choose of their own free will to take it. Therefore it is arranged to meet the expense here named by donations from those who are disposed cheerfully to contribute towards this object. The present price is not therefore set upon the paper, as a pretext for sending it to the poor gratis, as the writer has it. We are at a loss to know what our subscriber means by "forcibly seizing upon their possessions" unless he calls it so to require from those who are able to pay it, two dollars a year for the paper. But before this is pronounced an exorbitant price, a few items ought to be taken into consideration, such as a limited circulation, and no advertising. Any one can see that much of the work to be done on a paper is the same for a thousand copies that it is for one hundred thousand, and that therefore the larger the circulation, the cheaper accordingly can the paper be afforded. Just so with advertising: the more advertisements it has, the less is required for its support from its subscribers. We neither advertise nor have a wide circulation; and yet the Review is not the highest priced paper in the land, according to its size and reading matter, by any means. There are many papers published containing no more reading matter, and bearing the same, and some of them even a higher, price. Take for instance "The Israelite" published at Cincinnati, Ohio. It is a paper of eight pages like the Review; some larger to be sure, but it has doubtless a wider circulation, and it has three pages and over, of advertisements, and consequently less reading matter, and yet the price is three dollars a year. But we need not stop to argue this question further, as no reasonable person upon a moment's consideration, will ever quarrel with the Review for exorbitance of price. And we are sure that if no better reasons exist for discontinuing the paper than those given above, our own conscience at least will be clear in regard to it.