The crowning horror of Germany’s barbarities came with the sinking of
the _Lusitania_.
Perhaps nothing less shocking could have made us see how much less
cruel Nature is at her worst than man in his madness may be. Three years
before the _Titanic_ had been sunk on a clear and quiet night, because
a great iceberg formed in the frozen north had floated silently down
to where, crossing the ship’s course in mid-Atlantic, it struck her
the slanting blow that sent her to the bottom. Thus a great, blind,
irresistible force, operating without malice or design, had in that case
destroyed more than a thousand human lives. But when the _Lusitania_
was sunk in broad daylight, and nearly as many persons perished, it was
because our brother man, in the bitterness of his heart and the cruelty
of his fear, had been bent on committing wilful murder.
What is the present state of the soul of the person who perpetrated that
crime?
Can he excuse himself on the ground that he was obeying orders, or does
his conscience refuse to be chloroformed into silence by that hoary old
subterfuge? When he first saw the great ship sailing up in the sunshine,
its decks crowded with peaceful passengers, and he rose like a murderer
out of his hiding-place in the bowels of the sea, what were the feelings
with which he ordered the torpedo to be fired? When, having launched his
bolt, he sank and then rose again, and heard the drowning cries of his
victims struggling in the water, what were the emotions with which he
ran away? And when he returned to tell his story of the work he had
done, with what dignity of manhood did he hold up his head in the
company of Christian men? God knows--only God and one of his creatures.