The River Falls journal. (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1857-1861, 1857-07-15
GRAVES and GRAyEYARDs.

GRAVES and GRAyEYARDS.
There is no way in which refined and
cultivated taste more appropriately shows
itself than in adjoining and identifying
the dwellings, of the dead. The ancient
Egyptians gave but little care to their
earthly houses, but they spent years of
toll, and employed the highest artistic skill
upon their tonbs. There is a Philoso-
phr in this. We love to think of the
dead as crowned with immortal beauty,
as wearing the bloom and possessing the
vigor of eternal youth. We forget the
foibles and faults, which might have been
theirs. bit the remembrance Of their viz
tlos and kindnesses dwells ever with us.
And the spot where they are laid should
be beautiful to the eye, be adorned by
the hand of affection, that all our thoughts
Of the dead may be eleyating, pure and
pleasant. Then toe, grave yard if lastly
kept, is always place Of resort, not only
for those who have heart treasures buried
in its bosom, but for the stranger who
may be 'within our gates" Is it not mt
ting then that the grave yard should be
made attractive, that its location should be
pleasant, that it should be adorned by art,
that flowers aud beautiful shrubbery
should spring from the soil where lie the
''dear departed" so thatto one gazing up
on the scene, Death should be robbed Of
some offs asperities and as he thinks ofthe
time when his cheek shall be colorless and
his eyes closed forever, he viii be enabled
to look with quiet resignation, with sub
ducd and chastened pleasure,
Unto the great Unknown,
Into the silent land
Notwithstanding the sneers of the
Sceptic, the heartless philosophy of the
Stole and the faith of the Christian, death
is an event almost universally dreaded
It is not the agony of dissolving nature
which we fear, but it is the sense of that
mystery which shrouds our exit from this
world and entrance upon another. Even
he who trustingly confdes in the Scrip
tural revelations Of future world, is awed
and startled by the very grandeur OF those
revelations, and he passes into the portal
Of death with that trembling hesitation,
with which a peasant would enter the pal
ace Of King.
But it is in our power to to rob death
of many of its unnatural terrors. The
grave yard should be made 50 attractive as
to become a pleasant place Of resort, and
so, gradually the idea of death will become
domesticated in our minds, the "better
land" will become more familiar to our
thought, and the conviction viii live more
constantly within us, that we "are pass
ing through nature to eternity" We
have passed many pleasant hours in
grave yards. AS we now write there are
touching and beautiful scenes, and some
sad and sorrowful ones which memory
brings wildly to mind. But it would pro-
tract our article too far, to relate them.
Yet we cannot close without enriching
our page with q passage from Shaks-
peare-a passage which has elected the
admiration, and touched the feelings
d thousands "a passage which VIII COM
mand the praise and call forth the sympa-
thy of men and women as long as genius
shall be priced, and the heart be moved
by the tear of sorrow, and the sob Of
grief-the burial of Ophelia.
Ophela needs no eulogy. To know
that HAMLET loved her is q sufficient
guaranty that she possessed all sweet and
and maidenly qualities. Yet thinking of
her burial we love to think of her life, of
her filial obedience, of her maidenly love,
of her sweet praise of the loved one, of
her touching lament over his supposed
madness, of the last sad scene when
chanting snatches ofold tunes" she sank
to muddy DEATH" We think of Ham
lot too, of the thoughts and emotions
which must have crowded upon him as he
talked with the grave diggers, soliloquised
over the skull of 'poor Yorick" and
watcLe that form laid in the grave, in
which had been garnered up all his youth
fId loves.
The reluctant priest has performed the
obsequies. She has had
The maiden strewment, aud the bring
ing home
OF bell and burial"
When Laertes asks,
Must then no more be done?
Priest. No more be done!
We should profane the service of the dead,
To sing a requiem, and such rest to her
As to peace parted souls.
Lqer. Lay her i the earth:-
And from her fair and unpolluted flesh,
MAY yiolets springl-I tell thee, churlish
priest.