Like all men of wide and lofty views, he was not exclusive in his press proclivities. He liked a paper as a paper, a pleasant medium of the progress of human reason, or, as he better expressed it, as a "lofty manifestation of public opinion."

The Fourth Estate (El cuarto poder) by Armando Palacio Valdés is a classic novel of Spanish realism set in a provincial town in Asturias, on Spain's northern coast. Blending social satire with psychological drama, he story explores the growing power of the press and its influence on public opinion, ambition, and private lives at the end of the 19th century.