Stones of the Temple Part 2

"What! then I suppose we should have first a service from Master Scoff, the bill-sticker and Mormon preacher, and next from Master Scole, the Baptist preacher, then from Father La Trappe, the Roman Catholic minister, and then, perhaps, sir, it might be your turn. Why, sir, 'twould be almost like going back to the Easter fair."

"Well, my friend, in one respect it would be worse; for it would be discord all the year round. But I trust G.o.d will frustrate these wicked designs of our Church's foes. Long, long may it be ere the sanct.i.ty of our churchyards is thus invaded."

"Amen, say I to that, sir, with all my heart."

"And, thanks be to G.o.d, Matthew, that Amen of yours is now re-echoing loudly throughout the length and breadth of England."

_CHAPTER IV_

GRAVE-STONES

"And he said, What t.i.tle is that that I see? and the men of the city told him, It is the sepulchre of the man of G.o.d."

2 Kings xiii. 17.

"I never can see a Churchyard old, With its mossy stones and mounds, And green trees weeping the unforgot That rest in its hallow'd bounds; I never can see the old churchyard, But I breathe to G.o.d a prayer, That, sleep as I may in this fever'd life, I may rest, when I slumber, there.

"Our Mother the Church hath never a child To honour before the rest, But she singeth the same for mighty kings, And the veriest babe on her breast; And the bishop goes down to his narrow bed As the ploughman's child is laid, And alike she blesseth the dark brow'd serf, And the chief in his robe array'd.

"And ever the bells in the green churchyard Are tolling to tell you this:-- Go pray in the church, while pray ye can, That so ye may sleep in bliss."

_Christian Ballads._

"It is an awful thing to stand With either world on either hand, Upon the intermediate ground Which doth the sense and spirit bound.

Woe worth the man who doth not fear When spirits of the dead are near."

_The Baptistery._

Ill.u.s.tration: Stinchcombe Church

GRAVE-STONES

A golden haze in the eastern sky told that the sun which had set in all his glory an hour before was now giving a bright Easter Day to Christians in other lands. The evening service was ended, and a joyful peal had just rung out from the tower of St. Catherine's,--for such was the custom there on all the great festivals of the Church,--the low hum of voices which lately rose from a group of villagers gathered near the churchyard gate was hushed; there was a pause of perfect stillness; and then the old tenor began its deep, solemn tolling for the burial of a little child. The Vicar and his friend Mr. Acres, who had been walking slowly to and fro on the churchyard path, stopped suddenly on hearing the first single beat of the burial knell, and at the same instant they saw, far down the village lane, the flickering light of the two torches borne by those who headed the little procession of Lizzie's funeral.

They, too, seemed to have caught the spell, and stood mutely contemplating the scene before them. At length Mr. Acres broke silence by saying, "I know of but few Parishes where, like our own, the funerals of the poor take place by torch-light; it is, to say the least, a very picturesque custom."

Ill.u.s.tration: Grave Stones

"It is, indeed," replied Mr. Ambrose, "I believe, however, the poor in this place first adopted it from no such sentiment, but simply as being more convenient both to themselves and to their employers. Their employers often cannot spare them earlier in the day, and they themselves can but ill afford to lose a day's wages. But these evening funerals have other advantages. They enable many more of the friends of the departed to show this last tribute of respect to their memory than could otherwise do so; and were this practice more general, we should have fewer of those melancholy funerals where the hired bearers are the sole attendants. Then, if properly conducted, they save the poor much expense at a time when they are little able to afford it. I find that their poor neighbours will, at evening, give their services as bearers, free of cost, which they cannot afford to do earlier in the day. The family of the deceased, too, are freed from the necessity of taxing their scanty means in order to supply a day's hospitality to their visitors, who now do not a.s.semble till after their day's labour, and immediately after the funeral retire to their own homes, and to rest. I am sorry to say, however, this was not always so. When I first came to the Parish, the evening was too often followed by a night of dissipation. But since I have induced the people to do away with hired bearers, and enter into an engagement to do this service one for another, free of charge, and simply as a _Christian duty_, those evils have never recurred. I once preached a sermon to them from the text, 'Devout men carried Stephen to his burial' (Acts viii. 2), in which I endeavoured to show them that none but men of good and honest report should be selected for this solemn office; and I am thankful to say, from that time all has been decent and orderly. When it is the funeral of one of our own school-children, the coffin is always carried by some of the school-teachers; I need hardly say this is simply an act of Christian charity. Moreover, this custom greatly diminishes the number of our Sunday burials, which are otherwise almost a necessity among the poor[19]. The Sunday, as a great Christian Festival, is not appropriate for a public ceremony of so mournful a character as that of the burial of the dead; there is, too, this additional objection to Sunday burials: that they create _Sunday labour_. But, considering the subject generally, I confess a preference for these evening funerals. To me they seem less gloomy, though more solemn, than those which take place in the broad light of day. When the house has been closed, and the chamber of death darkened for several days (to omit which simple acts would be like an insult to the departed), it seems both consonant with this custom which we have universally adopted, and following the course of our natural feelings, to avoid--in performing the last solemn rite--the full blaze of midday light. There is something in the noiseless going away of daylight suggestive of the still departure of human life; and in the gathering shades of evening, in harmony with one's thoughts of the grave as the place of the _sleeping_, and not of the _dead_. The hour itself invites serious thought. When a little boy, I once attended a midnight funeral; and the event left an impression on my mind which I believe will never be altogether effaced. I would not, however, recommend midnight funerals, except on very special occasions; and I must freely admit that under many circ.u.mstances evening funerals would not be practicable."

"I see," said Mr. Acres, "that the system here adopted obviates many evils which exist in the prevailing mode of Christian burial, but it hardly meets the case of large towns, especially when the burial must take place in a distant cemetery. Don't you think we want reform there, even more, perhaps, than in these rural parishes?"

"Yes, certainly, my friend, I do; and I regret to say I see, moreover, many difficulties that beset our efforts to accomplish it. Still something should be done. We all agree, it is much to be deplored that, owing to the necessity for extramural burial, the connexion between the parishioner and his parish church is, with very rare exceptions, entirely severed in the last office which the Clergy and his friends can render him, and the solemn Service of the Burial of the Dead is said in a strange place, by a stranger's voice. Now this we can at least partly remedy. I would always have the bodies of the departed brought to the parish church previous to their removal to the cemetery; and the funeral knell should be tolled, as formerly, to invite their friends and neighbours to be present, and take part in so much of the service as need not be said at the grave. It would then be no longer true, as now it is, that in many of our churches this touching and beautiful Service has never been said, and by many of the parishioners has never been heard. Then let the bearers be men of good and sober character. How revolting to one's sense of decency is the spectacle, so common in London, of hired attendants, wearing funeral robes and hat-bands[20], drinking at gin-palaces, whilst the hea.r.s.e and mourning coaches are drawn up outside! Then I would have the furniture of the funeral less suggestive of _sorrow without hope_; and specially I would have the coffin less gloomy,--I might in many cases say, less _hideous_: let it be of plain wood, or, if covered, let its covering be of less gloomy character, and without the trashy and unmeaning ornaments with which undertakers are used to bestud it. As regards our cemeteries, I suppose in most of them the Burial Service is said in all its integrity, but in some it is sadly mutilated. 'No fittings, sir, and a third-cla.s.s grave,'

said the attendant of a large cemetery the other day to a friend of mine, who had gone there to bury a poor parishioner; which in simple English was this:--'The man was too poor to have any other than a _common grave_, so you must not read all the Service; and his friends are too poor to give a hat-band, so you must not wear a hood and stole.'

My friend did not of course comply with the intimation."

Ill.u.s.tration: Grave-Stones

"Well, Mr. Vicar, I hope we may see the improvements you have suggested carried out, and then such an abuse as that will not recur. Much indeed has already been done in this direction, and for this we must be thankful."

"Yes, and side by side with that, I rejoice to see an increasing improvement in the character of our tombstones and epitaphs."

"Ah, sir, there was need enough, I am sure, for that. How shocking are many of the inscriptions we find on even modern tombstones! To 'lie like an epitaph' has long been a proverb, and I fear a just one. What a host of false witnesses we have even here around us in this burial-ground!

There lies John Wilk, who was--I suppose--as free from care and sickness to his dying hour as any man that ever lived; yet his grave-stone tells the old story:--

'Afflictions sore long time I bore, Physicians was in vain.'

And beyond his stands the stone of that old scold Margery Torbeck, who, you know, sir, was the terror of the whole village; and of her we are told:--

'A tender wife, a mother dear, A faithful friend, lies buried here.'

I often think, Mr. Ambrose, when walking through a churchyard, if people were only half as good when living, as when dead they are said to have been, what a happy world this would be; so full of 'the best of husbands,' 'the most devoted of wives,' 'the most dutiful of sons,' and 'the most amiable of daughters.' One is often reminded of the little child's inquiry--'Mamma, where are all the _wicked_ people buried?' But did you ever notice that vain and foolish inscription under the north wall to the 'perpetual' memory of 'Isaac Donman, Esq.'? Poor man! I wonder whether his friends thought the 'Esq.' would _perpetuate_ his memory. I wish it could be obliterated."

"I have told John Daniels to plant some ivy at the base of the stone, and I hope the words will be hidden by it before the summer is over. I find this the most convenient mode of concealing objectionable epitaphs.

But is it not an instance of strange perversity, that where all earthly distinctions are swept away, and men of all degrees are brought to one common level, people will delight to inscribe these boastful and exaggerated praises of the departed, and so often claim for them virtues which in reality they never possessed? What can be more out of place here than pride? As regards the frail body on which is often bestowed so much vain eulogy, what truer words are there than these?--

'How loved, how valued once, avails thee not; To whom related, or by whom begot: A heap of dust alone remains of thee, 'Tis all thou art, 'tis all the proud shall be.'

These kind of epitaphs, too, are so very unfair to the deceased. We who knew old Mrs. Ainstie, who lies under that grand tombstone, knew her to be a good, kind neighbour; but posterity will not believe that, when posterity reads in her epitaph that 'she was a spotless woman.' It is better to say too little than too much; since our Bibles tell us that, even _when we have done all, we are unprofitable servants_. There are other foolish epitaphs which are the result of ignorance, not of pride.

For instance, poor old Mrs. Beck, whose son is buried in yonder corner (it is too dark now to see the stone), sent me these lines for her son's grave-stone:--

'Here lies John Beck, aged 19 years, Father and mother, wipe away your tears.'

I persuaded her instead to have this sentence from the Creed:--'I believe in the communion of Saints.' When I explained to her the meaning of the words, she was grateful that I had suggested them.

Ill.u.s.tration: Grave-Stones

The two things specially to be avoided in these memorials are flattery and falsehood; and, moreover, we should always remember that neither grave-stone nor epitaph can benefit the _dead_, but that both may benefit the _living_. Therefore a short sentence from the Bible or Prayer Book, expressive of hope beyond the grave, is always appropriate; such as:--'I look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come;' or words which either may represent the dying prayer of the deceased, or express a suitable pet.i.tion for ourselves when thus reminded of our own approaching departure, such as: 'Jesus, mercy,' or 'G.o.d be merciful to me a sinner,' or 'In the hour of death, good Lord, deliver us.' How much better is some simple sentence like these than a fulsome epitaph! But the funeral is nearly at the gate; so I must hasten to meet it."

"And I will say good evening," said Mr. Acres, "as I may not see you after the service; and I thank you for drawing my attention to a subject on which I had before thought too little."

Mr. Ambrose met the funeral at the lich-gate. First came the two torch-bearers, then the coffin, borne by six school-teachers; then John and Mary Daniels, followed by their two surviving children; then came old Matthew, and after him several of little Lizzie's old friends and neighbours. Each attendant carried a small sprig of evergreen[21], or some spring flowers, and, as the coffin was being lowered, placed them on it. Many tears of sadness fell down into that narrow grave, but none told deeper love than those of the old Shepherd, who lingered sorrowfully behind to close in the grave of his little friend.

Ill.u.s.tration: Llanfechan Church

_CHAPTER V_

THE PORCH