The untimely decease of the _Republic_, the paper which was set up some months ago to express in a semi-official way the views of the Administration and its immediate adherents on public questions, has a good deal that is tragic about it, as far as its principal conductor is concerned. That a man of as much experience of politics and of newspapers as Mr. Norvell, the editor, had, should have supposed it possible to start a daily morning paper in this city at a time when a successful daily is worth millions, and when there are four already in possession of the field, without any other claims on popular attention than its being the mouth-piece of the leading politicians of the party in power, and with a capital which in his dreams only reached $500,000, and in fact only $40,000, is a curious though sad illustration of the power of the press over the imagination even of persons long familiar with it. The failure of the enterprise, however distressing in some of its aspects, is valuable as establishing more conspicuously and firmly than ever two facts of considerable importance in relation to journalism. One is, that when politicians so deeply desire an organ as to be willing to set one up for the exclusive use of the party, it is a sure sign that the party is in serious danger of extinction. The other is, that the public mind is so fully made up that the position of a newspaper ought to be a judicial one, that all attempts to make a paper avowedly partisan can only be saved from commercial failure by large capital, extraordinary ability, and well-established prestige.