New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1878-04-06
FAIR PLAY FOR CREMATION.

Soma of the good orthodox folk in Pennsyl-
wanna brought bill before the Legislature
recently, intended to put summary stop 10
Dr. LIE MOynes proceedings. Burning the
dead Is to be made an indictable offence, pun
isbable with fine and Imprisonment. The bill
il introduced with the usual wholesome
Scotch-Irish shudder of horror at novelties
unauthorized by the kirk. Cremation is by
call right thinking people believed to be I'M
"christlan, inhuman and wicked" asserts the
complacent preamble. We have no doubt that
DR.. LIE Moyne, who, as an old abolitionist,
knows how necessary to the growth OF re-
form is a gust of opposition, will be rather
amused and gratifed if he and his retOrt are
accommodated by the Harrisburg Legisa-
ture. The country is wide and there is plenty
of room for the crematOries which are already
projected in it. The American public, too,
likes fair play, and very little serious atten-
ton would be given by the mass of the peo-
pie to the crematiOnists, probably, so long as
they carried on their burning unmolested !;
but as soon as they are prosecuted, the pubic
will look anxi0usy into the matter to see
what there is III it,
The truth Is, the disposal of our dead Is
mainly a matter of feeling, not religion. The
heathens burned the dead body, but that does
not make the burning itself heathenish any
more than are the physical sports, training
and medicine by which they cared Tor the
living body. and which we inherit from them.
The chief basis for religious argument about 1t
is. apparently, the belief that the elements
of the body will all be called out of the grave
at the resurrection. But the elements are not
separated by burning more surely than by the
slow decay in the ground. They are not de-
stroyed by either process, and God, II he
chooses, can call them together again. Neither
can the law interfere on the ground OF inhu-
mainly. where neither the dead nor the living
are injured.
The sole point left for discussion is, then,
whether burning or burial is the most decent,
revercnt, and innOxiOus mode OF disposal OF the
dead. DR.. lie Moyne and his party point to
the thousands of bodies packed in city ceme-
teries in all stages of putreiactiOn; to the
poison percoIating into the water-currents and
reaching up to the air, and to all the horrible
vormy changes which our beloved dead must
PASS through before they become ashes. They
offer, instead, swift, bright passage into the
original elements by method which they
assert is simple, rcyerent, and totally harmless
to the living the gases being consumed Ill the
flames before they reach the outer air.
Opposed to them il the iron force of custom,
which in matters of feeling carries men with
il against the weightiest and most reasonable
argument. There are n myriad tender assoc
ciations for most OF us i'll the green graves
and solemn shade of village churchyards,
which it will need volumes of logic to over
come. But as there is apparently large mi
nority of men and women in the country who,
if they did not shrink from notoriety, would
prefer cremation, any attempt to force our
sentiment upon them as law is unjust, and
must in the end prove abOrtive.