Each Part of "Celebrities of the Day" will contain from 15 to 20 memoirs of persons more or less distinguished as "Workers." The Editor reserves to himself the right of either destroying or returning unused MSS., although, where practicable, he will adopt the latter course. All letters concerning contributions are to be addressed to "The Editor." at the publishing offices of "Celebrities of the Day," whilst those having reference to either Advertisements or Subscriptions for copies should be IT has been said that Biography is "overdone;" that the world already knows all about its choicest sons; and that those who are written of are frequently unworthy of the distinction. That a half-truth is conveyed in this general statement the conductors of "CELEBRITIES OF THE DAY" are prepared to admit, for many even obscure men and women have, ere now, been not only "praised" and "puffed,' and in so palpable a manner that both the little Johnson and his friendly Boswell have been "hoist w'th their own petard," a biographical anti-climax being the necessary, because logical, result. But regarding the other statement involved in the expression of the dictum that the vast and ever-widening field of contemporary biographical literature has been exhaustively gleaned, it is the mission of "CELEBRITIES OF THE DAY" to disprove. As long as TIME has a wallet, the world will witness a series of startling surprises, and in no sphere so much as in the region of Contemporary Biography. To carefully enquire into the past and present (and, even into the future, for men may fairly be judged by their previous history), of the world's truest workers, whether in the Gilded Chamber, the Lower House of Parliament, the Church, the sympathetic worlds of Art, Literature, Science, or even in the warehouse laboratory, or workshop, in order to enlighten the general community as to the lives of those who keep SOCIETY from absolutely degenerating, is a noble enterprise, and if but one solitary student of our pages is made to emulate some of those useful and honourable careers which we shall periodically unfold, the launching of "CELEBRITIES OF THE DAY," to float with similar barques on the waters of popular approval, will not have been an altogether thankless or fruitless undertaking. THE EDITOR. |