Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1881-02-12
OBITUARY.

SAMUEL a. BUNNELL was born Sept. 6
1851, and died Feb. 3, 1881. He died of phth-
isis pulmonaiis, and therefore sank by slow
decay into utter exhaustion, when the
wheels of life stood still. There was no ag-
ony in his death, no convulsive throes were
witnessed; he simply fell asleep.
allow blest the righteous when he dies!
When sinks weary soul to rest,
How mildly beam the closing eyes
How gently heaves tn expiring breast!
So fades summer cloud away;
So sinks the gale when storms are Ger;
So gently shuts the eye or day
So dies wave along the shore.
Lifes duty done, as sinks the clay,
Light from its load the spirit flies;
While heaven and earth combine to say,
How blest the righteous when he dies.
If the poet had, as an eyewitness, been
describing the death-bed scene enacted at
the residence of S. A. CALDWELL Esq, on the
/ Sd inst, he could not have more faithfully
portrayed the departure of our lamented
young friend from earth to the home os the
beautiful and the good. S. A. Bunneff was
| a model young man. His uncle, who reared
him, says he was one of the best boys he
ever saw. He had all the gentleness and
delicacy of a woman, and no girl was more
modest. Indeed; his modesty was excess
i've, and restrained due expression OF his
intellectual capacity aud accomplishments.
1t is not claimed that he had the highest
order of mind, or the greatest degree of
learning, but 1t is affirmed that he had no
ordinary intellect, and he was well inform
ed. Fond of reading, he had explored the
field of knowledge more extensively and
understood it more thoroughly than many
of his acquaintance had observed. OF a
meditative turn, he enjoyed retirement and
the eompanionship of his own reflections
on what ne had learned, and therefore new
er paraded his knowledge. 1t was only In
the circle of intimate friends that he dis
played any self-assertion or gave an exh1-
bition of his talents and his information.
He sometimes penned his thoughts, and
there are witnesses who testify that he pos
sessed no mean power of composition. But
his highest need of praise is in the fact that
he was christian. Some one has said, "The
christian is the highest type of man." If
that be true, then s. a. Bunne1 was the
highest type of man, for he was christian.
His life was uniform and continuous ex-
empIiffcation of the purity and excellence
of christianity, and his death demonstra-
ted its power to deliver from fear and to
make the soul exult amid the desolations of
its clay tenement. He did not merely &C
quience in the situation anddie without re-
sistance to the inevitable. An irrational
creature could die as well. But he triumph
ed and his last utterances were those of
victory. For forty-eight hours before life
was extinct he was in ecstacy and seemed
to be standing in the ante-chamber of
heaven with the beatific visions break
ing full upon his view. While on the other
hand he was perfectly self-conscious and in
telligent, holding communion with rela-
tive and friend upon questions of immortal |
1t falls to the lot of few men to |
witness many deaths characterized by such |
joy. His death is highly sug |
gestive and monitory to his youthful COM
panions and friends. Which of them would /
not, in dying, exchange all that they now
hope to be for the hope which sustained
him in the final hour? That hour is COM
ing and will finally be met by every one,
What then will support the soul whose
happiness depends upon conditions and
does not rest upon principle of truth?
j. ID. BARBEE.