BEAUTY OF DEATH. He that hath bent him o'er the dead, Have swept the lines where beauty lingers, The rapture of repose that's there The fixed yet tender traits that streak The languor of the placid cheek And but for that sad shrouded eye, That fires not-wins not-weeps not-now And but for that chill changeless brow, Whose touch thrills with mortality, The doom he dreads, yet dwells upon- The first-last look-by death revealed. To these exquisite lines in the Giaour, in the context of which the aspect of Greece is compared to a beautiful corpse, Lord Byron appends a note, in which he remarks that "this peculiar beauty remains but a few hours after death." "But (says Mr. Leslie) I have been told, by those in the habit of making casts, that on the second day, the expression is generally improved, and even on the third day it is often still finer. I have in several instances, been ordered to make drawings of the dead, and though in every case I have entered the room where the body lay somewhat reluctantly, yet I have invariably felt reluctant to quit it." "At Kreutzberg, near Brunn, there is a church, under the pavement of which lie, in one vault, the bodies of twenty-five monks, in open coffins. The dryness of the air has preserved them from decay, though the last buried has lain there for more than a century. I visited the church with a party of ladies, who at first hesitated to descend into the abode of the dead. We all, however, went down, each carrying a lighted taper, and such was the fascination of this singular scene, that we lingered in it for some time. The air was perfectly pure, and we seemed to be in another world, with its own eternal interests effacing for the time all other interests. It seemed to us a mistake that death should be represented by poets or by painters as a hideous phantom. We could not contemplate those withered faces of old men, for they seemed all old, and think of death otherwise than as a gentle friend. Their attitudes were varied, and all had a kind of grace which, though we knew it to be arranged by their friends, seemed perfectly Grief for the Dead. 163 natural. One, the gardener, had a chaplet of withered leaves round his head. Ail were clothed in the dress of their order; and their clothes, as well as their bodies, though the last were dried to mummies, appeared to be little decayed." "Lord Byron says, 'In death from a stab, the countenance preserves its traits of feeling or ferocity, and the mind its bias to the last.' I can only say that in all the casts I have seen from those whose deaths have been violent or painful, I have noticed the same repose of the features and the same faint indication of a smile that assists in constituting the beauty of death in other cases. Causes wholly unconnected with the state of mind or feeling at the time of dissolution contribute, in individual cases, to beautify the features. The cast taken, very imperfectly, by Dr. Antommarchi, from the face of Napoleon, is more handsome than any bust or portrait of him; and, indeed, has the look of a much younger man than he appears in the latest portraits. This is easily accounted for. Illness had reduced the superabundant fleshiness of the lower part of his face, and brought it back to the condition of an early period; and death, by leaving the mouth slightly open, had destroyed that expression of selfish determination which the thin compressed lips give to every portrait of Napoleon. The profile of the cast is the most perfectly beautiful profile of a man I ever saw; and it should here be noticed that, as in this instance, the beauty added by death to a face originally of very fine proportions has nothing to do with metaphysical causes, so I believe it is the case in every instance; the faint smile being caused by the last slight convulsion after all consciousness has ceased. "The beauty of death is not easily explicable. How far its strange fascination may arise from the idea suggested of a repose compared with which that of the most tranquil sleep is agitation, (says Leslie,) I will not pretend to determine. I knew a man of the highest order of mind, a man of fine feelings, but of great simplicity, and far above all affectation, who, standing by the corpse of his wife, said 'It gives me very pleasurable sensations.' And yet, he truly loved her."-Leslie's Autobiography. GRIEF FOR THE DEAD. Archbishop Whately has these admirable remarks: "As for the grief which a man may be supposed to feel for the loss-the total and final loss-of some who may have been dear to him on earth, I have only this to remark, that a wise and good man in this life, in cases where it is clear that no good can be done by him, strives, as far as possible, to withdraw his thoughts from evil which he cannot lessen, but which still, in spite of his efforts, will often cloud his mind. We cannot, at pleasure, draw off our thoughts entirely from painful subjects which it is in vain to think of. The power to do this completely, when we will, would be a great increase of happiness; and this power, therefore, it is reasonable to suppose, the blest will possess in the world to come, and will be able, by no effort of the will, completely to banish and exclude every idea that might alloy their happiness."-Scripture Revelations. It is an exquisite and beautiful thing in our nature, that when the heart is touched and softened by some tranquil happiness or affectionate feeling, the memory of the dead comes over it most powerfully and irresistibly. It would almost seem as though our better thoughts and sympathies were charms, in virtue of which the soul is enabled to hold some vague and mysterious intercourse with the spirits of those whom we dearly loved in life. how often and how long may those patient angels hover above us, watching for the spell that is so seldom uttered, and so soon forgotten! Alas! It has even been observed that immoderate grief, if it does not exhaust itself by indulgence, easily assumes the character of superstition or weakness, or takes a type of insanity. There is, in many minds, a fearful presentiment that great happiness cannot be of long duration; but if the prosperous periods of life are those which seem to form the natural climax and terminating point of life, they are those in which we can least bear the loss of others. The sudden removal of one who is in the very midst of his usefulness, in whose success we had "garnered up our hearts," creates a revulsion of feeling which poor humanity can ill support. It is the anticipation of re-union hereafter which throws the only light that can penetrate the gloom of the mourner's mind. He is yet to have a meeting beyond the grave; and whilst this idea mitigates grief, it renders the prospect of death itself less terrible. It was in this way that Mrs. Garrick endeavoured to remove the terrors of death, after her loss of the great actor. Boswell tells us that in 1781, when Mrs. Garrick received company for the first time since her husband's death, she talked of him with complacency; and while she cast her eyes on his portrait which hung over the chimney-piece, said that "death was now the most agreeable object to her." INTERFERENCES OF THE DEAD WITH THE LIVING. Isaac Taylor has a remarkable passage on this question, which, he considers, "ought not to be summarily dismissed as a mere folly of the vulgar." He says: "In considering questions of this sort, we ought not to listen, for a moment, to those frequent but impertinent questions that are brought forward with the view of superseding the inquiry: such, for example, Antiquity of Burial Clubs. 165 as these: 'What good is answered by the alleged extra-natural occurrences?' or 'Is it worthy of the Supreme Wisdom to permit them?' and so forth. The question is a question, first, of testimony, to be judged on the established principles of evidence, and then of physiology; but neither of theology, or of morals. Some few human beings are wont to walk in their sleep; and during the continuance of profound slumber, they perform, with precision and safety, the offices of common life, and return to their beds, and yet are totally unconscious when they awake, of what they have done. Now, in considering this or any such extraordinary class of facts, our business is, in the first place, to obtain a number of instances, supported by the distinct and unimpeachable testimony of intelligent witnesses; and then, being thus in possession of the facts, to adjust them, as well as we can, to other parts of our philosophy of human nature. Shall we allow an objector to put a check to our scientific curiosity on the subject, for instance, of Somnambulism, by saying, 'Some of these accounts have turned out to be exaggerated or totally untrue!' or 'this walking in the sleep ought not to be thought possible, or as likely to be permitted by the Benevolent Guardian of human welfare?'"-Physical Theory of Another Life. DEATH CUSTOMS. In many parts of Britain is prevalent a superstition, preserved to us in an aphoristic form in the following distich: Happy is the wedding that the sun shines on; Otherwise thus: Sad is the burying in the sunshine; But blessed is the corpse that goeth home in rain. In Brittany it is commonly believed that if any one draws a likeness of another, and carries it away with him, he holds, at any distance of time or place, an unlimited power over the original, whose death he may cause, at any time, by the destruction of the portrait ! In the Diary of the Rev. John Ward, 1662-1681, we find this curious entry: "Dr. Conyers dissected a person not long ago, that died for love in London; and they found (at least, as they fancied,) the impression of a face upon his heart." ANTIQUITY OF BURIAL CLUBS. Mr. Kenrick, in his ingenious work on Roman Sepulchral Inscriptions, adduces the following evidence of the existence of burial clubs among the Romans from a monument found at Lanuvium, a town of ancient fame for the worship of Juno Sospita, about nineteen miles from Rome, on the Via Appia. The inhabitants of this town appear, out of flattery towards the Emperor Hadrian, in whose reign the marble was erected, to have formed themselves into a college for paying divine honours to Diana and Antinous, with which they strangely combined that of a burial club, not forgetting the festivities which formed so important a part of all acts of religion among the Romans. To prevent disputes, the laws of the association were inscribed on marble, and probably set up in the temple of the two deities. An amphora of good wine was to be presented to the club by a new member, the sum of 100 sesterces (about 15s.) was to be paid as entry money, and five asses (little more than 2d.) per month as subscription. Their meetings were not to take place oftener than once a month. If any one omitted payment for (so many) months (the marble is here mutilated), no claim could be made, even though he had directed it by will. In case of the death of one who had paid his subscription regularly, 300 sesterces (21. 5s.) were allotted for his funeral expenses, out of which, however, 50 were to be set apart for distribution at the cremation of the body. The funeral was to be a walking one. If any one died more than twenty miles from Lanuvium, and his death was announced, three delegates from the college were to repair to the place where he had died, to perform his funeral, and render an account of it to the people. Fraud was to be punished by a fourfold fine. Twenty sesterces each were to be allowed to the delegates for travelling expenses, going and returning. If the death had taken place more than twenty miles from Lanuvium, and no notice had been sent, the person who had performed the funeral rites was to send a sealed certificate attested by seven Roman citizens, on the production of which the usual sum for the expenses was to be granted. No funeral of a suicide was to take place. There are many other rules tending to preserve order and promote good fellowship, but these are all which relate to the burial club. This curious document is an additional proof how much ancient life resembled modern life, when we obtain a view of it, as it were, intus domique, through the medium of its monuments. "GOD'S ACRE."* This is a phrase applied to the churchyard, or burial-place, to denote its sanctity. It is, of course, well known that in the ancient days of the Church, these burial-places were formed round the resting-places of famous saints. The same feeling may be traced in later days. The burial ground appertaining to St. George the Martyr, Queen-square, Bloomsbury, is a long and narrow slip of ground behind the Foundling Hospital. A strong prejudice appears to have existed against this burial-place, and no person was interred here till the ground was broken for the pious Robert Nelson, author of Fasts and Festivals, whose character for piety reconciled others to the place, and other interments followed quickly. * See an interesting work with this title, by Mrs. Stone. |