The Hillsdale standard. [volume] (Hillsdale, Mich.) 1851-1909, 1852-06-22
An Hour in a Graveyard.

Who possessed of sensitiveness and reflec-
ton. can pass an hour in graveyard, without
feeling wiser. though sadder, less worldly,
though purer far? We could never imagine
how the CAV. the wanton and reckless could
dreserve their respective characters in the
sleeping plase of the departed where an aw-
full silence rests. and the forms of the unseen
spirits seem 10 whisper in the passing breeze
To us it is spot of sacred musng, melancholy
memories darkening the sunshine of the soul,
vet not extinguishing its lustre. There,
thought produces a twilight, through whose
rarifed atmosphere beings and ideas, and
scenes. and assocatings glimmer with strik-
ing vet softened light The past becomes the
present. and the future, like sybil's proph-
ecv. steals indistinctly through the curtained
folds of your imagination, revealing.
The grave the shroud the matthok ana the worm"
Horror, with her ghas,ly wings, enshrouds
your perceptions, and that responsiveness ire
sistable seals yonr source of Happiness. Then
slowly, and as far off music, breaks upon your
vision field ofglory beyond the tomb, par
adse of stars and ange's, fountains and flow
ers, where weary strangers to those realms are
weary now no more, but blessed. And your
self as them You see, and conieDtment and
Joy bubble up in the fountain of your heart.
Here your reflections revert to your real
self, and to the earth, and what you have been
and what others are The voice of concienco
speaks, the littleness of this terrine sphere
fresh presents ITSELF as small drop in the
broad ocean, and you almost shrink with your
expanded being, lest it should be smothered
in so mined space. New lights burn, new
aspirations start into life, until borne into the
tide of unknown emotions, you rise upward
and upward and only an effort or an accident,
hurls vour thoughts back to the verdant sward,
the cold graye-stone and the voices that speak
but emit no sound. uF-
Passion and prejudice die away in the con-
temptation prndnced by graveyard. The
struggles of Iife-its ambitions and desires
find no corresponding sympathies there. Too
ephemeral, too seT,seless, thev appear, to find
a moments entertainment. What are loves,
friendships, hatreds! Nothing, absolutely
nothing-unless the slight discoid jarring an
universal harmony, cloud of vapor upon q
sea of crystal After all the toll and suffer-
ing imposed on man, he must come to this
Whatever his conquests, his possessions. his
nrido, bis iunueuct, ne can occupy but a lew
feet of earth: tbs enough, nor seek he more
The tomb is no respecter OF persons; there all
lie, reduced to one great level Souls are the
same: bodies make no distinction.
Friends are friends still, perhaps; foes sleep
side by side, nor fearing nor fearful The
great kingdom of nature resumes her sway; II
gave il has taken, and the slumber OF worlds
will follow in its train. A dream. foreiaste
of heaven, descends, aud earth, like the flower
before the frosts, loses.one by one its charmes,
and you long TO leape ont of existance-where,
YOU know not, yet into certainty.
Such were ovr musings of an hour, in the
burial place of dust, the great screen OF souls,
shutting out infinite from finite, time from
eternity! Clouds, deep and heavy, grew upon
us, and broke here and there, to Introduce
streams of light, which fell, but did no, warm.
Earth promised nothing; heaven, all incom-
prehensible, dazzled-too vivid for comprehen-
sion. too bright for hope. WEAKNESS with
aspiration, hope against hope, lighted and
quenched desires in apathy, each and all came,
| fickered and went out, then came, and were,
and were not Such were our musings! ~.
[Cincinnati Com,