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WHO WAS TO BLAME?

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park, Washington, D. C. · May 9, 1912

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 89, No. 19.

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WHO WAS TO BLAME?

By Fred Clare Baldwin

Lines on the loss of the steamship "Titanic," with sixteen hundred souls on board FRED CLARE BALDWIN, D. D.
Who was to blame? Pray, do not charge this monstrous tragedy to God, He made the icebergs? Well, what then? He also made the human mind; And he hath taught our ever-curious ken How best the ways of safety we may find, And how to shun the paths by danger trod — God will not take the blame!
Who was to blame? His head the captain can not raise To answer us or shield his name From censure or from praise. Beneath two miles of ocean depth he sleeps With that grave throng for whom the whole world weeps. Great names adorn that good bark’s list; Great deeds relieve that sickening mist; Great men were there; when came the time That human nature shows its best or worst, They measured up to all that greatness durst Expect of them: in death all were sublime.
Who was to blame? In part the spirit of this prideful age — Our blind, insatiate lust of luxury; Our false disdain of all simplicity; Our wild and senseless rage for speed; Our maddening haste That will not pause to reckon up the waste; Nor least of all, our gluttonous greed! Where were the life-boats? Answer ye Who can not forfeit for a single hour The warm and genial hospitality Of palace life. What though the treacherous sea Stands ready to reveal its ruthless power — The Public was to blame!
So ancient Rome went down, And other empires of renown! And so, God grant we may not do, And will not if our sodden ears will hear The message these calamities make clear: We must return again to simpler ways, And be content ofttimes to sacrifice Our self-indulgent pleasures and our ease, Or earth will lose what heaven has learned to prize; And we shall surely fall on darker days, Yea, darker days than these!
— Christian Advocate.