Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1884-03-09
ESTHETIC BURIAL.
A Suggestion by Miss NJ. Betham-Ed-
wards.
PAN Nan E0seyfa

Surely now is the moment to say few
words about the burials OF the future
The sudden changes of the weather at this
time OF the year seriously affect the bills
OF mortality, and hardly a day passes but
our street is traversed by one of those
/ lugubriOus professions which add much
more than is usually imagined to the
gloom associated with dissolution and the
grave. We are thereby reminded OF the
necessity for some association formed for
the purpose Of bringing about a less hide
GUS fashion of bearing to the tomb, and
there can be no doubt of the readiness
with which many of us would join 1t when
formed. The matter is easy enough. 1t
is only necessary for a few learned,
thoughtful, and artistic men and women
TO league together and accomplish in this
field what has already been accomplished
IN domestic art. Membership should be
open to all under certain conditions, and
all members, whether resident in the
United Kingdom or in the more accessi-
bic quarters of Europe, should be entitled
to aesthetic burial. l am putting down
these thoughts on paper merely as ten
tatiVe suggestion, in the hope that the
suggestion will be seriously taken up by
those who have the leisure and capacity
to work it out. Abundant scope for in
yention here, and of course the mode and
scale of interment should depend UpOl
closed with him. Music should be the
inYariaDle accompaniment to the grave,
always solemn, vet not altOgetheruncheer
ful. Inc usual hoarSo Trainings and
mutes must be altogether abolished and
replaced by a light open car, with white
drapery and abundance OF flowers in the
case of children, but in that of men and
women, cut down in their promise, their
prime, or at the close Of a long and useful
career, symbolism altogether original
and strictly appropriate. At the present
day, except in the case of royalty and
military men, one funeral is precisely
like another, the additional pomp impart-
ed by wealth lending perhaps extra SOM
breness. What we want is, not only
9stheticism, but individuality in our
mode of burial. The man of a thousand
ideas should not be borne to the tomb
after a fashion as insignificant as that of
the man without any. The noble charac-
ter, the commanding spirit, the splendid
achievements, which raise one human be-
ing from another should be symbolized to
the eyes of all as his remains are borne to
their last resting-place. Thus funeral
would be a moral lesson as we'll as a
beautiful, albeit solemn spectacle.
For estheticism before everything! Let
there be, first of all, beauty in our mode
of burial. Let us no longer tolerate the
nineteenth-centUry undertaken, so little
in keeping with the Christianity OF any
age or the scientific spirit of our own. 1t
is odd how the hOpefulness and faith in
culcated by the Christian religion should
be thus belied in one of its most solemn
ceremOmals. Surely all who believe in
the "WOrld to come and the life eyerlast-
ing" should put on white robes and gar
lands instead of Grape and sables when
hidden to funeral. Nor to the philoso-
phic minded outside Christianity can
death have any unbearable sadness about
it, except in the case of the very young,
and those prematurely cut off. Who, see
ing that death is a condition of our NOR
tai state, would wish to live on and on
indefinitely, surviving his friends and his
faculties? Surely, in Dryden's words:
And could we choose the time and choose
Alright,
IT'S best to die our honor at the height,
When we have done our ancestors no shame,
But served our friends and well secured our
fame.
Then should we wish our happy life to close.
And leave no more for fortune TO dispose.
So should we make our death glad relief
From future shame, from sickness, and from
grief,
Enjoying while we live the present hour,
And dying in our excellence and flower.
This matter of aesthetic burial is Of more
moment than may at first sight be appar-
ent. Life must be the best expression of
humanity, and often it is very inadequ-
dUe eApFeSblOH, loo. III an age OI pOSlUlNe
science, a generation imbued with the
spirit of Darwin, Herbert Spencer, and
others, it is high time that we should ac-
company, and when our own turn comes
be accompanied. to the grave after fash
ion less meaningless and unDecomng
than is at present in vogue. We are
evolutionists. We believe in the theory
OF development and the doctrine of con-
tinuity. Why, then, this unmitigated
gloom and despair, this lugubrious taw-
driness of funerals? Surely the symbol
ism of such an occasion should be more
cheerful, more moving. Initiators may
comfort them selves with the re-
Election that if they cannot make
things better, they certainly cannot
make them worse. So let us hope
soon to be enabled to enroll ourselves in
an aesthetic burial association, which
would certainly do away with one pang
at the notion of quitting this earthly stage
of activity and maybe usefulness. 1t is
a matter for the consideration of all, alike
the devOut believer and the humble seeker
after truth, for Christian, Jew, and agnOs-
tic, irrespective of creed. The suggestion
is thrown out for the leisurely and the
true lovers of beauty to take up, but /
could make many more did space permit.