The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1912-06-07
THE LIGHT or FAITH

/ disaster, spoke thus beautifully:
! There is another lesson, however,
Mr.. President, that this disaster has
taught us, of more Importance than
a change in our admiralty and navi-
CATION laws, and of far greater and
more overwhelming significance than
the lesson of corporate responsibility,
/ and that is the lesson of religious
faith. Disasters like this, instead of
weakening, should strengthen the
faith of the nation. There is no use
OF appealing to reason or to philoso-
ply in case of this sort. The mind
stands aghast and appalled, as these
calamities come thick and fast. We
forget in our moments of sorrow that
it never was intended that the intel
lect of man should reason out such a
problem. Suffering and affliction, as
they come to the pure and the inno-
cent in hundred forms, in inexplain-
able.
The commissions of nature alone
that have swept nlyriads of human
beings TO an untimely death cannot
be reconciled by any process of hui
man reasoning. When reason hats,
the Creator has implanted in the soul
another faculty, however, that gives
US light in the hour of tribulation. 1t
| is the light of faith, a pillar of fire in
the night of our darkness and despair.
Throughout my life | have spent
many hours of the day, and many ST.
lent and sleepless hours of the night,
in the struggle for the light of rea-
son, but in my advancing years the
! light that gives me fortitude an cour-
age is the sublime light of faith, that
never dims nor wanes, and at the SUI
preme moment when reason vanishes,
breaks in upon US with all the radi-
ance of the morning sun. We can
reason out the negligence of man, but
We cannot reason out why, in the
course of nature, an iceberg from the
Arctic Zone should just at this very
moment have taken it's course upon
the path of desolation and death.
Upon all this and kindred subjects
the most profound intellect of the
greatest philosophers who ever lived
as much as the credulity of the ear
Hest races, who attributed every pre-
nomenon of nature to the interposi-
ton of Divine Providence. What this
nation needs are some severe lessons
that will strengthen the pillars and
the affairs of its faith We are to
large extent today defying the orGi-
nances of God, and the sooner we
awaken to a realizing sense of our
responsibility the better it will be for
the spiritual elevation of the country.
We are running mad with the lust of
wealth, and of power, and of ambi-
ton. We are separating society into
casts, with fabulous fortunes on the
one side and restitution and poverty
on the other. 1t takes a terrible warn
ing to bring us back to our moorings
and our senses. We are abandoning
the devout and simple lives of our an
is weakening at the foundations. Ii
this disaster teaches no lesson or
points no moral, then let us pass it
by with stoical difference, until the
next disaster comes, and in the mean
time let the carnival go on. May the
heart-rending scenes upon this night
of anguish and of woe give us faith
and lead us back to the affairs of our
fathers. | will not rehearse the ago
mics of this midnight sacrifice. l can
not afford to dwell upon them or lis
ten to the details that almost distract
the mind and break the heart. 1t is
the lesson and the moral that | am
searching for.
| will say this, however, in closing:
The agonies of separation at this
scene, that palsy the tongue when It
attempts to describe them, were
worse than the agonies of death
knew we'll one of the courageous pas
sengers who, with his wife, yielded
up their lives on this occasion. The
man was splendid type of American
citizenship. l served with him in the
house of representatives and he was
esteemed and beloved by all who
knew him. In private life he was a
benefactor of the human race In
public life he was an unpurchasable
tribune of the people. His heroic wife
had the blood of martyrs in her veins,
and from the most authentic account
that | can obtain, the account of a
witness who was not examined by the
committee, because her testimony
was not necessary for the purposes