The deeply regretted, and dearly beloved wife of
John Stuart Mill
Her great and loving heart, her noble soul, her clear, powerful,
original intellect, made her the guide and support, the instructor in
wisdom, and example in goodness, as she was the delight of those who had
the happiness to belong to her. As earnest for the public good as she
was generous, and devoted to all who surrounded her, her influence has
been felt in many of the greatest improvements of the age; and will be
in those still to come. Were there even a few hearts and intellects like
hers, this earth would soon become the hoped-for heaven.
_Scott_
Sir Walter Scott died at Abbotsford, September 21, 1832, aged 61 years,
and was interred in the family burying-ground in Dryburgh Abbey on
September 26, 1832.
The Great, the Good, the nobly gifted mind,
To dust its mortal part has now resigned,
The ethereal spark now wings its flight on high
To mix with kindred spirits in the sky.
Fair Scotia mourns, the rich and poor deplore
That he, the child of genius, is no more!
Weep, classic Tweed, pour out your floods of woe,
Your great magician’s dead; a man who never made a foe.
_Queen Elizabeth_
Among the complimentary epitaphs which were composed for Queen Elizabeth
was the following, as quoted in Camden’s _Remaines_:
Weep, greatest Isle, and for thy mistress’ death,
Swim in a double sea of brackish water:
Weep, little world, for great Elizabeth;
Daughter of war, for Mars himself begat her;
Mother of peace, for she brought forth the latter.
She was and is, what can there more be said?
On earth the first, in heaven the second maid.
The great Tudor queen, who was not deficient in taste, would assuredly
have been displeased with such “fustian stuff” as this. What she really
wanted may be gathered from Bacon’s “Character of Queen Elizabeth,”
where he says:
“She would often discourse about the inscription she had a mind should
be on her tomb. She gave out that she was no lover of glory and pompous
titles, but only desired her memory might be recorded in a line or two
which should very briefly express her name, her virginity, the time of
her reign, the reformation of religion, and her preservation of the
peace.”
_Samuel Johnson_
The Royal Commission on MSS. unearthed at Spencer House, St. James’s,
London, the following epitaph by Soame Jenyns on Dr. Johnson:
Here lies poor Johnson; reader have a care;
Tread lightly, lest you rouse a sleeping bear.
Religious, moral, generous, and humane
He was; but self-sufficient, rude, and vain;
Ill-bred, and overbearing in dispute,
A scholar and a Christian and a brute.
Would you know all his wisdom and his folly,
His actions, sayings, mirth and melancholy?
Boswell and Thrale, retailers of his wit,
Will tell you how he wrote and talked and coughed and spit.
_Beust_
Count Beust directed that above his tomb should be inscribed:
Peace to his ashes; justice to his memory.
_Elihu Yale_
The founder of Yale University is buried in the church-yard of Wrexham,
North Wales, ten miles from Hawarden. His tomb in front of the church
door is inscribed with these lines:
Born in America, in Europe bred,
In Africa travelled, in Asia wed,
Where long he lived and thrived, in London dead;
Much good, some ill he did, so hope all’s even,
And that his soul through mercy’s gone to heaven.
_John Harvard_
In 1828 the Alumni of Harvard University erected a monument to the
memory of its Founder at Charlestown, Mass. On the eastern face of the
shaft, and looking towards the land of his birth and education, is this
short inscription in his mother tongue:
On the twenty-sixth day of September, A. D. 1828, this stone was erected
by the graduates of the University of Cambridge, in honor of its
founder, who died at Charlestown on the twenty-sixth day of September,
A. D. 1638.
On the opposite face of the shaft, and looking westward towards the
walls of the University which bears his name, is another inscription,
which, in consideration of his character as the founder of a seat of
learning is expressed in the Latin tongue:
In piam et perpetuam memoriam Johannis Harvardii, annis fere ducentis
post obitum ejus peractis, Academiæ quæ est Cantabrigiæ Nov-Anglorum
alumni, ne diutius vir de litteris nostris optime meritus sine monumento
quamvis humili jaceret, hunc lapidem ponendum curaverunt.
_Cheyne_
Dr. Cheyne, Physician-General to the Forces in Ireland, in his
directions for interment after death, included the following epitaph:
Reader! the name, profession, and age of him whose body lies beneath are
of little importance; but it may be of great importance to you to know
that, by the grace of God, he was led to look to the Lord Jesus as the
only Savior of sinners, and that this “looking unto Jesus” gave peace to
his soul.