NOW, let us be frank!
Let us look at this subject of Advertising squarely, and dissect it.
Let us discard all prejudice or predilection, and accept only Evidence, in our final investigation.
Let us cut out sentiment, precedent, and "Popular Opinion," and treat the subject as though we had never heard of it before and "came from Missouri."
If, for instance, we had a load of Hay to sell how would we attempt to sell it?
Would we show our customers the Daisies that grew in it, ask them to note the Style of the loading the fine pair of horses that draw it, and the Vandyke or Otherwise beard of the Driver?
Would we tell him this is the same kind of Hay as was raked by "Maud Muller on a Summer's day" in Whittier's poem?
Guess not! - eh?
We'd tell him of the nutritious qualities that particular load of Hay possessed, for the feeding of horses, and then we'd name the price delivered, show why the hay was worth it, and let it go at that.
Now, if our customer lived at a distance, and we must sell him the Hay by letter, how would we proceed?
Quote "Maud Muller" to him - then refer to the Daisies, the Horses, the Beard?
No, sir - not for a moment!
We would confine ourselves carefully to the feeding qualities of our Hay, and to the advantages of buying while the price was right.
But, suppose we had five hundred loads of this Hay to sell, instead of one load, and did not know just where to write to in order to sell it.
That's when we'd Advertise!
But does the fact of our going into Print mean that we must go into Literature, Art, or Clever Conceits in space-filling too, in order to sell our Hay through Advertising?
Are we not still trying to sell just Horsefeed? How can we expect the picture of "Maud Muller on a Summer's Day" to help us close a deal with an unpoetical party who has Horses to Feed, and who must do it economically?
The Horse owner knows good Hay when he sees it, and he will know it from description almost as well as from sight.
When he needs good Hay then the most interesting thing we can tell him is a description of the Hay we have to sell, and why it is good, and why it is worth the price.
No amount of Maud Muller picture, or "Association of Ideas" will sell him Hay so surely and quickly as plain Hay-talk and Horse-sense.
But the Advertiser will be told that "in order for an Advertisement to sell goods it