The Last Words Of Distinguished Men And Women Part 10

DIOGENES (the Cynic, son of Isecius), B. C. 413-323. Just what were his last words is uncertain, but a short time before he died, he was asked where he would be buried when dead. "In an open field," said he. "How!"

enquired one, "are you not afraid of becoming food for birds of prey and wild beasts?" "Then I must have my stick with me," said Diogenes. "But,"

continued the other, "you will be devoid of sensation." "If that is the case," said he, "it is no matter whether they eat me or not, seeing I shall be insensible to it."

His death was occasioned by indigestion from eating a neat's foot raw; but some say he put an end to his life by holding his breath. After his death there was a great dispute among his friends and followers as to who should be accorded the privilege of burying him, and when they were about to come to violence, the magistrates interfered and quieted the disturbance.

DODD (Rev. Dr. William, author of numerous religious and other works. He was the founder of "The Magdalen" for reclaiming young women fallen from virtue, the "Poor Debtors' Society" and the "Humane Society." He was executed for forgery), 1729-1777. Just before his death he said to the executioner, "_Come to me_," and when the executioner obeyed, the doctor whispered to him. What he said is not known, but it was observed that the man had no sooner driven away than he took the place where the cart had been, under the gibbet, and held the doctor's legs, as if to steady the body, and the unhappy man appeared to die without pain.

DOMINIC ("Saint," founder of the order of Dominicans and of the order of Preaching Friars. He was one of the instigators of the cruel and inhuman crusade against the Albigenses about 1212. Many strange stories are told of him, and among these that he offered himself for sale to the highest bidder, in order to raise money for charitable purposes), 1170-1221.

"_Under the feet of my friars_," when asked where he would like to be buried.

DONNE (John, D. D., English poet and theologian), 1573-1631. "_I were miserable, if I might not die._" Some say his last words were: "I repent of my life except that part of it which I spent in communion with G.o.d, and in doing good." Others say his last words were, "Thy will be done."

Dr. Donne was formerly Dean of St. Paul's. Among other preparations for his death, he ordered an urn to be cut in wood, on which was to be placed a board of the exact height of his body. He then caused himself to be tied up in a winding-sheet. Thus shrouded, and standing with his eyes shut, and with just so much of the sheet put aside as might discover his death-like face, he caused his portrait to be taken, which, when finished, was placed near his bedside, and there remained to the hour of his death. He was buried in St. Paul's Cathedral, where a monument was erected over him, composed of white marble, and carved from the above-mentioned picture, by order of his dearest friend and executor, Dr. King, Bishop of Chichester.[17]

[17] Charles V., of Spain, seems to have entertained the same morbid desire for a personal acquaintance with his own _postmortem_ appearance and condition. In Robertson's History of the Reign of the Emperor Charles V. we have this account of the monarch's attendance upon his own funeral: "He resolved to celebrate his own obsequies before his death. He ordered his tomb to be erected in the chapel of the monastery. His domestics marched thither in funeral procession, with black tapers in their hands. He himself followed in his shroud.

He was laid in his coffin with much solemnity. The service for the dead was chanted, and Charles joined in the prayers which were offered up for the rest of his soul, mingling his tears with those which his attendants shed, as if they had been celebrating a real funeral. The ceremony closed with sprinkling holy water on the coffin in the usual form, and all the a.s.sistants retiring, the doors of the chapel were shut. Then Charles rose out of the coffin, and withdrew to his apartment, full of those awful sentiments which such a singular solemnity was calculated to inspire." This story is somewhat changed in Stirling's "Cloister Life of the Emperor Charles V."

If I must die, I'll s.n.a.t.c.h at every thing That may but mind me of my latest breath; Death's-heads, Graves, Knells, Blacks, Tombs, all these shall bring Into my soul such useful thoughts of death, That this sable king of fears Shall not catch me unawares.--_Quarles._

DORNEY (Henry, a man of peculiarly beautiful life and religious experience. His "Contemplations and Letters," published after his death, had a large circulation), 1613-1683. "_I am almost dead; lift me up a little higher_," to his wife.

DREW (Samuel, English preacher and author. He commenced life as an infidel shoemaker, but after conversion gave himself to constant study of the Bible and Christian Theology. He wrote the once famous book, "The Immateriality and Immortality of the Soul"), 1765-1833. "_Thank G.o.d, to-morrow I shall join the glorious company above._" Last _recorded_ words.

DRUMMOND (Henry, author of "Natural Law in the Spiritual World," "The Ascent of Man" and a large number of published lectures and addresses), 1851-1897. "_There's nothing to beat that, Hugh. It is a paraphrase of the words of Paul: 'I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him, against that day,'_" said of the lines which Dr. Barbour had just joined with him in singing:--

"I'm not ashamed to own my Lord, Or to defend His cause, Maintain the glory of His cross, And honor all His laws."

The last words of Drummond, as given above, are only the last _recorded_.

He said much afterward, but most of his words were disconnected. His mind wandered idly from thought to thought without aim or purpose.

DWIGHT (Timothy, American clergyman and author, President of Yale College. He wrote the beautiful hymn, "I Love Thy Kingdom, Lord"), 1752-1817. "_O, what triumphant truth!_"

EDWARD I. (of England, surnamed "Long-shanks"), 1239-1307. "_Carry my bones before you on your march, for the rebels will not be able to endure the sight of me, alive or dead_," to his son Edward.[18] He died while endeavoring to subdue a revolt in Scotland.

[18] These instructions were probably ignored; for, when his tomb was opened by the Society of Antiquaries in 1771, those present gazed for a moment on the features of the great victor before they sank into dust. The gold cloth was still folded round the colossal corpse; and the cast in the eyes was distinctly noticeable. The snow-white hair still remained. The coffin was then filled with pitch.--_Farrar._

John Zisca, general of the insurgents who took up arms in 1419 against the Emperor Sigismund, seems to have had a like spirit with Edward I. He would revenge the deaths of John Huss and Jerome of Prague, who had been cruelly burned at the stake for their religious faith. He defeated the Emperor in several pitched battles, and gave orders that, after his death, they should make a drum out of his skin. The order was most religiously obeyed, and those very remains of the enthusiastic Zisca proved, for many years, fatal to the Emperor, who, with difficulty, in the s.p.a.ce of sixteen years, recovered Bohemia, a.s.sisted by the forces of Germany. The insurgents were 40,000 in number, and well disciplined.

EDWARD VI. (son of Henry VIII. and Queen Jane Seymour), 1537-1553.

"_Lord take my spirit._"

EDWARD (Prince of Wales, surnamed the Black Prince from the color of his armor), 1330-1376. "_I give thee thanks, O G.o.d, for all thy benefits, and with all the pains of my soul I humbly beseech thy mercy to give me remission of those sins I have wickedly committed against thee; and of all mortal men whom willingly or ignorantly I have offended, with all my heart I desire forgiveness._"

EDWARDS (Jonathan, President of the College of New Jersey and one of the greatest of metaphysicians), 1703-1757. "_Trust in G.o.d and you need not fear_," to one who lamented his approaching death as a frown on the college and a heavy stroke to the church.

The most awfully tremendous of all metaphysical divines is the American ultra-Calvinist, Jonathan Edwards, whose book on "Original Sin" I unhappily read when a very young man. It did me an irreparable mischief.--_An English author._

EGBERT (Col. Henry Clay), 1840-1899. "_Good-bye, General; I'm done. I'm too old_," said to Gen. Wheaton, who bending over the wounded officer, exclaimed. "n.o.bly done, Egbert!" Col. Egbert was killed near Manila in the war between the United States and the Philippines.

In all his army service he was wounded four times before he received his death wound. He was accounted one of the most competent officers in the army, and in action it was said of him that the army had no officer more dashing, with the possible exception of Gen. Guy V. Henry, now in command of the United States forces in Porto Rico. He was a little man, not above five feet five inches, and weighed only about one hundred and ten pounds. He had reddish hair, streaked with gray, and wore a red mustache and imperial. In plain clothes he was most immaculate, and he was called the best dressed officer in the army.

_N. Y. Daily Sun, March 27, 1899._

ELDON (John Scott, Earl, Lord Chancellor of England), 1750-1838. "_It matters not where I am going whether the weather be cold or hot_," to one who spoke to him about the weather.

He was a bigoted admirer of the law, of which he was so consummate a master. Projects of law reform cut him to the soul, and he has been represented as shedding tears on the abolition of the punishment of death for stealing five shillings in a dwelling-house.--_Appleton's Cyclopaedia of Biography._

ELIOT (Rev. John, commonly called "The Apostle to the Indians"), 1604-1690. "_O Come in glory! I have long waited for Thy coming. Let no dark cloud rest on the work of the Indians. Let it live when I am dead.

Welcome joy!_"

ELIZABETH (Queen of England, and daughter of Henry VIII. by Anne Boleyn), 1533-1603. "_All my possessions for one moment of time._"

Some give her last words thus: "I will have no rogue's son in my seat."

When Sir Robert Cecil declared that she must go to bed and receive medical aid, the word roused her like a trumpet. "Must!" she exclaimed, "is _must_ a word to be addressed to princes? Little man, little man!

thy father, were he alive, durst not have used that word." Then, as her anger spent itself, she sank into the old dejection. "Thou art so presumptuous," she said, "because thou knowest that I shall die." She rallied once more when the ministers beside her named Lord Beauchamp, the heir to the Suffolk claim, as a possible successor. "I will have no rogue's son," she cried hoa.r.s.ely, "in my seat." But she gave no sign save a motion of the head at the mention of the King of Scots. She was, in fact, fast becoming insensible; and early the next morning, on March 24, 1603, the life of Elizabeth, a life so great, so strange and lonely in its greatness, ebbed quietly away.[19]

[19] There is a dim tradition that, much more than a century ago, the tomb under which the two sister-queens--Mary, the Roman Catholic, and Elizabeth, the Protestant, _regno consortes et urna_--lie side by side had fallen into disrepair, and that a bold Westminster boy crept into the hollow vault, and, through an aperture in the coffin, laid his hand on the heart of the mighty Tudor queen.--_Farrar._

ELIZABETH (Philippine Marie Helene, usually called Madame Elizabeth, sister of Louis XVI), 1764-1794. "_In the name of modesty, cover my bosom!_"

When she ascended the scaffold, the executioner rudely undid the clasp which closed the veil across her breast. "In the name of modesty," she said to one of the bystanders whose arms were not tied, "cover my bosom!"

Alison, in his "History of Europe," calls attention to the fact that "a similar instance of heroic virtue in death occurred in a female martyr in the early Christian church. Perpetua and Felicitas, both Christians, were sentenced in the year 203, to be killed by wild cattle at Carthage.

They were both attacked, accordingly, by furious bulls, who tossed them on their horns. So violent was the shock that Perpetua fell on the ground stunned; but partly recovering her senses, she was seen gathering her torn clothes about her, so as to conceal her limbs, and after tying her hair, she helped Felicitas to rise, who had been severely wounded; and, standing together, calmly awaited another attack."

ELLIOTT (Ebenezer, English poet known as the "Corn-Law Rhymer." He was a workman in an iron foundry who won the attention of the cultivated world by his verses, and rose to eminence by his "Corn-Law Rhymes" in which he urged the repeal of duties on corn. He wrote also "The Village Patriarch," "Byron and Napoleon," "Love" and a number of other poems of more or less merit), 1781-1849. "_A strange sight, sir, an old man unwilling to die._"

EMERSON (Ralph Waldo, American essayist, poet, and speculative philosopher), 1803-1882.