From time immemorial, medical men have strongly pointed out to municipal
authorities the dangers that arise from burying the dead within the
precincts of cities or populous towns. Impressed with the same conviction,
ancient legislators only allowed to the most illustrious citizens a
sepulchre in the temple of the gods. Euclides was interred in the temple
of Diana Euclis, as a reward for his pious journey to Delphi in search of
the sacred fire; the Magnesians erected a monument to Themistocles in
their forum; Euphron received the same honour in Corinth; and Medea buried
her two sons, Mermerus and Pheres, under the protection of Juno Acraea's
altars, to guard their ashes from their persecutors. Lycurgus was perhaps
the only Grecian legislator who recommended inhumation in temples and in
cities, to accustom youth to the daily spectacle of death.
The primitive Grecians, it appears, buried their dead in or about their
dwellings; and we find a law amongst the Thebans, ordaining that every
person who built a house should provide a repository for the dead upon his
premises. In latter days, both Grecians and Romans erected their tombs
outside of their cities, and chiefly by the road-side. It appears also,
that, among the Romans, the bodies of the lower orders were promiscuously
cast into wells, called _fruticuli_. Horace seems to allude to this
practice. _Hoc miserae plebi stabat commune sepulchrum._ The funerals of
the wealthy patricians appear to have been most sumptuous and costly, the
pall formed of valuable materials and decorated with splendid ornaments.
Thus Statius:
_Ditantur flammae: non unquam opulentioan ille ante cinis: crepitant gemmae:
atque immane litescit argentum, et pietis exsudat vestibus aurum._ The
laws of the twelve tables prohibited the practice of this waste of gold.
Both religious and civil motives might have dictated the propriety of this
regulation. The traveller, setting out upon a journey, and passing by the
sepulchres of his sires, could in the presence of their manes invoke their
protection; and on his return to his penates, safe from danger, he could
put up thanks to the gods for his preservation. As a prudential measure,
the interment of the dead beyond the walls of their towns prevented the
fatal consequences that might have arisen from extensive putrefaction and
infection, and moreover the burning of bodies would have exposed the
adjoining buildings to the danger of frequent fires. It is also possible
that policy dictated these sanatory enactments. The ancients held the
remains of the departed as a sacred trust, in the defence of which they
were ever prepared to fall; and it is not improbable that their warriors
would have rushed forth to meet the invader, before he would have defiled,
by his approach to their cities, the ashes of their ancestors. So
scrupulously religious were the Athenians in performing the funeral rites
of the dead, that they put to death ten of their commanders, after the
battle of Arginusae, for not having committed to the earth the dead bodies
that floated on the waters. Such was the dread of being deprived of
sepulchral rites, that it is related of several citizens of Cappadocia,
that during the pestilence that devastated their town in the reign of
Gallus and Valerian, they actually shut themselves up to perish in their
tombs.
There is no doubt but that their dead were buried in such a manner as not
to prove injurious to the survivors; and Seneca plainly says, "Non
defunctorum causa, sed vivorum, inventa est sepultura." The ancients both
burned and buried their dead, but inhumation appears to have been the
most early and the most approved rite. "Let the dead be buried," says a
law of Cecrops. Solon justifies the claims of the Athenians to the island
of Salamis, from the circumstance of the dead bodies interred on its
shores having been inhumed according to the Athenian custom, with their
feet turned to the west, whereas the Megarensians turned theirs to the
east.
In various instances the burial or the burning appear to have been adopted
upon philosophical doctrines. Democritus, with a view to facilitate
resurrection, recommended interment, and Pliny thus ridicules the
intention: "Similis et de asservandis corporibus hominum, et reviviscendis
promissa a Democrito vanitas, qui non revivixit ipse." Heraclitus, who
considered fire as the first principle, advocated the funeral pile; while
Thales, who deemed water the chief element, urged the propriety of
committing the departed to the damp bosom of the earth. Although burning
the dead was customary, there were curious exceptions to the rule. Infants
who died before cutting their teeth, persons struck dead with lightning,
were buried. The place of interment of infants was called the
_suggrundarium_.
The early Christians inhumed the bodies of their martyrs in their temples.
This honour was afterwards conferred on the remains of distinguished
citizens, illustrious prelates, and princes. The infectious diseases which
at various periods arose from this custom, induced Theodosius, in his
celebrated code, strictly to prohibit it; and he even ordered that the
remains of the dead thus inhumed should be removed out of Rome. The vanity
of man, and the cupidity of the priesthood, soon overruled these wise
regulations. Every family possessing sufficient means, claimed a vault
within the churches, and thereby the revenues of the clergy were
materially increased. At all times, even the dead appeared to have shared
with the living the obligation of supporting the ministers of the altar.
By a law of Hippias, the priestesses of Minerva received a choenix[6] of
wheat, and one of barley, with an obolus, for every individual who
departed this life. The _libitinarii_ of the Romans fulfilled the duties
of our undertakers, or rather of the directors of funeral pomp of the
French; yet they were attached to the temple of the goddess Libitina,
whose priests received a fee in silver for every one who died, under the
name of _Libitinae ratio_. Suetonius informs us, that in Nero's time the
mortality was so great during one autumn, that thirty thousand of these
silver pieces were deposited in the fatal treasury. To increase the
emoluments of this sacerdotal body, these _libitinarii_ sold at high
prices every thing that was requisite for the funeral ceremonies, received
a toll at the city gate through which the bodies were carried out, as well
as at the entrance of the amphitheatre through which the dead gladiators
were borne away. Phaedrus alludes to this speculation in one of his fables,
when speaking of a miser,
Qui circumcidis omnem impensam funeris,
Libitina ne quid de tuo faciat lucrum.
It is supposed that this avaricious divinity owed her name to the
displeasure which it must have occasioned to all who heard it,--_quod
nemini libeat_; but it is also possible that it was derived from her
bearing poor mortals away, whenever she fancied it, and _ad libitum_.
In more modern times, Theodolphus, Bishop of Orleans, complained to
Charlemagne that lucre and vanity had converted churches into
charnel-houses, disgraceful to the clergy and perilous to the community.
It was upon this representation that this prince, in his capitularies,
prohibited burials in churches under heavy penalties. But the laws of the
wisest could not prevent priesthood from considering this source of
emolument, although endangering public salubrity, an indisputable property
that could not be meddled with without endangering the church.
In England the custom of burying the dead in churches was first sanctioned
by Cuthbert, Archbishop of Canterbury, in 758, it having been previously
forbidden by Augustine, who had decreed that no corpse either of prince or
prelate should be buried within the walls of a city.
In France, Maret in 1773, and Vicq d'Azyr in 1778, pointed out the danger
of this practice in such glaring colours, that government by an edict,
only allowed church interment to certain dignitaries; but in 1804, by a
wise law that should be enforced in every civilized country, inhumation in
cities was entirely abolished. Amongst the numerous well authenticated
evil results of burying in churches that led to this wise prohibition, the
following were the most striking and circumstantial:
In 1773, in Saulieu, Burgundy, an epidemic disease arising from the
inhumation of a corpse in the church of St. Saturnin created considerable
alarm. The body of a corpulent person had been interred on the 3d of
March, and a woman was buried near it on the 20th of April following: both
had died of a reigning fever. During the last burial a fetid effluvia
arose from the vault, which pervaded the whole church; and, out of one
hundred and seventy persons who were present, one hundred and forty-nine
were attacked with the prevailing malady, although its progress had been
arrested amongst the other inhabitants of the town.
In 1774, a similar accident occurred in a village near Nantes, where
several coffins were removed in a vault, to make room for the lord of the
manor: fifteen of the bystanders died from the emanation.
In 1744, one-third of the inhabitants of Lectouse perished from a fever of
a malignant character that manifested itself after some works that
required the removal of a burial-ground. Two destructive epidemics swept
away large proportions of the population of Riom and Ambert, two towns in
Auvergne.
Taking this matter under consideration in a moral, or even a religious
light, it may be questioned whether any advantage can accrue from the
continuance of this pernicious custom, which during the prevalence of
epidemic diseases endangers the life of every person who resides near a
church. Does it add to the respect which the remains of the dead are
entitled to? Certainly not: the constant tolling of "the sullen bell"--the
daily cortege of death that passes before us--the graves that we hourly
contemplate, perusing monumental records which more frequently excite
unseasonable laughter than serious reflection--every thing, in short,
tends to make death of little or no moment, except to those who have heard
the mutes gossiping at their door. So accustomed, indeed, are we from our
childhood to sepulchral scenes, that, were it not for the parish-officers,
our churchyards would become the playground of every truant urchin; and
how often do we behold human bones become sportive baubles in the wanton
pranks of the idlers, who group around the gravedigger's preparations! So
callous are we to all feelings of religious awe when surrounded with the
dead, that our cemeteries are not unfrequently made the rendezvous of
licentiousness and the assembly-ground of crime, where thieves cast lots
upon a tomb for the division of their spoil.
With what different feelings does the traveller wander over the cemetery
of _Pere la Chaise_? I am well aware that many of the gewgaw attributes
that there decorate the grave, have been called the "_frippery_," "_the
foppery_" of grief; but does there exist a generous, a noble sentiment,
that may not be perverted by interested motives and hypocrisy into
contemptible professions? How often is the sublime rendered ridiculous by
bad taste and hyperbolic affectation! When we behold the fond lover
pressing to his lips a lock of hair, or the portrait of all that he holds
dear, the cold calculating egotist may call this the _frippery of love_;
but the stoic who thinks thus, has never known the "sweet pangs" of
requited affection, when, in bitter absence, the recollection of bliss
gone by, imbodies in our imagination the form we once pressed to our
respondent heart. The creation of our busy fancy stands before us, gazing
on us with that tender look that in happier days greeted the hour of
meeting; or trembles in our tears as when we last parted--to meet,
perhaps, no more! With what fervour of religious love do we not behold the
simple girl kneeling with uplift eye and hand on the green sod that covers
all that endeared her to existence, till, overwhelmed with burning,
choking regrets--as idle as they are uncontrollable--she sinks prostrate
on the cold earth that now shrouds that bosom which once nestled her young
hopes and fears! There have I seen the pale, the haggard youth,--to all
appearances a student,--seated mournfully by the side of a tomb, absorbed
in deep thought, heedless of the idlers who passed by him, looking at him
perhaps with contempt!--heedless of the swift flight of time, which
shrouded him imperceptibly in darkness, until he was warned by the
guardian of the dead that it was time to depart--and to depart _alone_! No
inscription recorded the "one loved name;" he would not expose it to the
unfeeling gaze of the heartless tourist: all he would willingly have
traced upon her tomb, would have been "Here lies _my own_!"
The mouldering earth, the fleshless skeleton over which he mourns, cannot
obliterate the remembrance of what she was: though her eyes, perhaps, no
longer exist, still their former languid, liquid look of bliss, beams
freshly in his recollection. The lips which once pronounced the long
wished-for avowal of mutual love are still moist and open to memory's
embrace--still seem to lisp the delicious _tu_! Our language is rich,
without comparison richer far than the French; but we have nothing so
endearing, so bewitching, as their _tu-toiement_: our _thee's_ and
_thou's_ are frigid, chilly, when compared to the _first toi_ that escapes
inadvertently from beloved lips! A French writer has beautifully expressed
this exquisite moment: "Le _premier tu_ est tout-puissant; c'est le _fiat
lux_ de l'ame; il est sublime, il debrouille le chaos!"
Sublime are the words, "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord!" Would
it be irreligious to say, "Happy are the dead who die beloved?" Their fond
and ardent heart had never been chilled by the withering hand of
infidelity and ingratitude. They died in an ecstatic dream of perfect
bliss on earth, and never were awakened to the world's mocking
realities!--they died when they felt and believed in their heart of hearts
that they were dearly beloved--could not be loved more dearly: with that
conviction, death, in a worldly acceptation, can never be untimely.
Probably, they died still sufficiently animated by a latent, lingering
spark of life, to press the hand that was so often linked in mutual
pressure in happy days--to feel the burning tear of anguish drop on the
pale cheek--to hear the sad, the awful, last word, _a Dieu!_--an
expression that habit has rendered trivial, but which bears with it, in
the tenderest solicitude, the most hallowed meaning; since, in pronouncing
it, we leave all that we cherish under the protection and the safeguard of
OUR GOD.
Affection deprives death of all horrors. We shrink not from the remains of
what we cherished. Despite its impiety, there was something refined in
that conviction of the ancients, who imagined that in bestowing their
farewell kiss they inhaled the souls of those they loved. How sweet are
those lines of Macrobius, originally attributed to Plato!
Dum semihulco suavio
Meum pullum suavior,
Dulcemque florem spiritus
Duco ex aperto tramite,
Animo tunc aegra et saucia
Cucurrit ad labia mihi!
Our Shakspeare has quaintly, yet beautifully, described this parting
embrace:
And lips, O you
The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss
A dateless bargain to engrossing death.
Nor was it only on the dying that the ancients bestowed this mark of
fondness: Tibullus and Propertius tell us, that, as their bodies were laid
on the funeral pile, they clasped them in a fond and last embrace.
In regard to the painted crosses, the chaplets, the garlands of flowers,
which mark the hallowed resting-place of the departed, it may be said that
they are but romantic and poetical expressions of grief. If it were only
real grief that expressed itself by outward testimonials, how soon would
mourning be banished as an idle expense!--the "inky cloak," and customary
"suits of solemn black--the trappings and the suit of woes," be laid
aside! What a different feeling does the splendid catafalcum, covered with
black velvet, studded with silver tears, and illumined by thousands of
glaring tapers, excite, when compared with the simple and verdant graves
which point out the spot "where souls do couch in flowers," blessed by
affection's tears instead of lustral waters. At all periods, amongst every
nation, flowers and certain trees seem to have been consecrated to the
dead. The Romans planted the wild vine and the box around their tombs.
Thus Martial to Alcimenes:
Accipe, non Phario nutantia pondera saxo,
Quae cineri vanus dat ruitura labor,
Sed fragiles buxos, et opacas palmitis umbras,
Quaeque virent lacrymis humida prata meis.
The wealthy assigned a beauteous garden to their departed favourites, as
in the instance of Augustus and Maecenas. Not only did they suspend
garlands over their tombs, but scattered flowers around them. Again in
Virgil,
Purpureosque jacit flores, ac talia fatur.
The same custom prevailed amongst the Grecians, who considered all purple
and white flowers acceptable to the dead. The Thessalian's strewed
Achilles' grave with the immortal amaranth and lilies. Electra complains
that the tomb of Agamemnon received no myrtle boughs; in short, instances
of this practice are every where to be found. In addition to flowers and
perfumes, ribands and hair were also deposited on their sepulchres.
Electra adorns Agamemnon's tomb with her locks, and Canace laments that
she had not been able to perform the same rite on her beloved Macareus.
Poets tell us that precious ointments and wines were poured upon their
monuments; and we find, in Euripides, Helen bidding Hermione to take locks
of her hair, honey mixed with milk, and wine, to the sepulchre of her
aunt.
Amongst the Chinese, to the present day, the cypress and the fir, shade
their cemeteries: the former tree, an attribute of Pluto was ever
considered funereal, hence called _feralis_; and the _feralia_ were
festivals in honour of the dead, observed by the Romans. Varro pretends
that the cypress was called funereal from _funus_, as it emitted an
antiseptic aroma. Pliny and others pretend that it typified the dead,
from its never shooting out fresh sprouts when the trunk was hewn down. At
any rate, to this hour, it is planted in burying-grounds in every
civilized country.
The yew-tree has also been considered an emblem of mourning from the
earliest times. The custom of planting it singly appears also to be very
ancient. Statius, in his Thebaid, calls it the _solitary yew_. In England,
the trees planted in churchyards were protected by legal enactments, as
appears by a statute of 35 Edward I. From the scarcity of bow staves, they
had been frequently despoiled by our numerous archers; and, to meet this
service, by an enactment of Edward IV. every foreign trader was obliged to
bring in four bow staves for every ton of imported merchandise; Elizabeth,
from the scarcity of this important article, put the statute in full
force.
Let us then hope, both for the living and the dead, that this custom,
which obtains in France and other countries, will be adopted by us,
instead of becoming the subject of ridicule. It is far more desirable to
see families repairing to the tomb of the departed on the anniversary of
their death, than to behold them daily passing by their remains with cold
indifference.
It would scarcely be believed upon the continent of Europe, that to this
very hour bodies are buried in confined churchyards in the most crowded
and dirty parts of the British metropolis, such as Russel-court,
Drury-lane, and various other similar holes and corners; the rudest
nations were never guilty of such a glaring impropriety. In the kingdom of
Siam, the remains of the opulent are burnt with great ceremony, while the
bodies of the poor are carried out and exposed on mountains: in Ceylon,
the remains of the indigent are interred in the neighbouring woods; the
rich consumed on gorgeous funeral piles.
The Chinese inhume their dead at some distance from their cities and
towns; it is only the bodies of the rich and noble that are allowed to
remain on the premises of the family. Navarette mentions a curious custom
prevalent in one of their provinces, Chan Si, where, in the event of two
betrothed persons dying at the same period, they are married while their
coffins are still in their former dwelling, and afterwards burnt together.
By the accounts of various travellers, the wealthy Chinese are burnt with
great pomp, and their monuments are most curious and expensive. Their
mausoleums are actually halls or grottos, decorated with splendour: and
they inter with the deceased many articles to which he might have been
attached during life, and that may add to his comforts after death. A
custom that was more prevalent before the invasion of the Tartars--a comb,
a pair of scissars to pare his nails; four little purses, containing the
nail-parings of the defunct, were placed in the coffin, and, amongst the
wealthy, gold coin and jewels were inserted in the mouth. The Hottentots
bury their dead in the wild clefts of rocks and caverns; the Peruvians
bear theirs to the neighbouring hills and mountains. The Greenlanders wrap
their dead in furs and skins, and carry them to a considerable distance
from their huts. In Kamtschatka and Siberia bodies are covered with snow
in caverns and caves; and the African savages perform the same funeral
rites as the Irish: their dead are carried to the burying-ground, followed
by crowds of relatives and other people, who join the procession,
bellowing and howling most piteously, "Oh! why did you die? did you want
any thing that was ever denied you?" and after the funeral the survivors
invariably get drunk on palm-wine, or any strong liquor they can procure;
a custom similar to the _circumpotatio_ of the Romans.