Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1878-07-03
Extravaganza Of Funerals.

1t was very sensible clergyman at Pitts
burg who recently read a paper upon the
expensiveness of funerals and they were
very sensible colleagues who adopted his
views as their opinion. Mere fashion is
nowhere more hateful than in the burying
of the Dead and none the less hateful be-
cause it imposes enormous expenses upon
those who cannot afford them. The savings
of year are often squandered in the idle
ostentation of funeral. IL is not unnat-
ural feeling among the poor that the last SER
vice they can render to a beloved friend
shall not fail in any usual distinction, and
the result is that living family is often
straitened that dead member of it may lie
in a mahogany coffin and be followed by
long train of carriages TO his grave. Reform
must come from those who set the fashion,"
and modest simplicity in funerals can be
attained only by the example of those who
can afford to be extravagant.
The worthy undertaken, who lives by the
death of his fellow-creatures, is naturally
desirous that grief shall be lavishly mani
Tested, and he encourages to the utmost this
sombre splendor. The young American used
to be shocked as he read in English stories
OF mutes and mourning carriages, of men
hired to wear the garb of sorrow, and of
grief measured by train of emptiness.
Two or three years ago the movement against
the extravaganza began in England, and it
has the public sympathy and support of very
eminent persons. 1t has shown itself in this
country by the common request, with the
announcement of a death, that no flowers be
sent A simple and beautiful tribute of af-
fection has grown into an oppressive fash
ion, and certain flowers have become odious
N m from, thair apcfan MT 10
tion with funerals. When such gifts are in
truth the offerings of love and sympathy, no
symbols can be more touching, but the mo-
ment they spring from the mere force of
fashionable custom, and are sent to the house
of mourning as gifts are sent by formal ac-
quaintances to bride, with no more feeling
than in the leaving of ceremonious visiting
cards, they are touching and significant no
longer The change in the mere fashion of
flowers upon such occasions can be carried
by the same good sense into every other fu-
neral extravaganza, so that the poor need no
longer feel that their dead are slighted if
they are not buried with ruinous expense.
There was another suggestion made at
Pittsburg which is worthy of consideration.
1t was proposed that funeral sermons, as
matters of course, should not be preached (;
and to this suggestion there will be probably
very general amen. They are of necessity
eulogies, for no good-hearted preacher would
choose such time to tell unpleasant truths.
Yet if man has been selfish, hard, grasp
ing, sef-indulgent, sordid-and there are
such men-what is the poor preacher to do
The well-meaning reply that every person
has something good in him, and the eulogist
can speak of that, is conclusive if the preacher
is not to give his honest view of the char
acter of the dead. But TO say of man no.
torious for meanness that he went regularly
to church, or Of debauchee that he gave
generously to the poor is not to tell the truth,
but to dodge it. A change in this habit,
however, must spring from the good sense
of the clergyman and the community in
which he lives. And the first step toward
the change is calling attention to the sub
ject as the Pittsburg clergymen have done.
-Haper's Magasine for July.