The Press., 1891-04-02

just punishment for our idiotic imbecility away. We deck it with rare flowers, and trim it with beauteous vestment, but it eludes our grasp and is gone forever. We photograph it on the wall; we house it in costly wood and vestmont we erect marble fortress, but it glides away like the stealthy foot of time and is seen no more. From this let us hasten, with our grief and loss, to the standpoint of THE IM- PERIsHABLE.
 Amid the wastes of winter stands the enduring evergreen. Roses fade, but the aroma of roses is bottled for coming years. Rocks disintegrate, but amid the decay diamonds gleam. Forms are dissolved but force is unwasted. Sitting amid our ruins, the perishable, we ask what is the imperishable Spirit is imperishable. Consciousness affirms that the soul is unit, and disso- lution is not possible for monadic self. Only compounds can be dissolved, but the soul is not compound. The arms of death cannot reach the soul, therefore, and the spirit, like the matter of the body, survives mortality. Wife and mother as 8 compound of body and spirit no longer exists, but wife and mother as spirit exists as truly as before. We only anchor the frail bark that bore her on life's rough sea, in the roadstead of Gods acre. The husks are removed but the kernel survives. The tenement decays but the tenant emigrates to transmortal- ity. Amid the debris of wasted rocks the diamond "crops out' uninjured.
 Influence is imperishable. Departure inaugurates deeper appreciation. Iris true, but
 "Strange that summer skies and sunshine Never seem one half so fair,
 As when winters snowy pinions, Shakes the white down from the air." When the train is past we see its size. Dear as wife and mother has been in the past, she is dearer to-day than ever be- fore. The tide of her influence will con- tinue to rise with the flood of our grief. Her words, her wishes, her will are stronger than in the past. Much as we have respected her in the past we worship ! her to-day. She reigns queen above our hearts and, !"being dead she yet speaks" Mother and wife is not passed, she is more real than ever. Christs death 'draws all men unto him." The infiu- ence or wife and mother never dies. She will walk our streets in the garb of her l children; she will live in the hearts of her friends; her mantle will fall on filial shoulders, and her wishes be incarnated | in the lives of her friends. Her influence has taken a new lease of life.
 Character is imperishable. Character, as reputation, survives dissolution. The esteem of friends will stand as the pillar of heaven. The spontaneous tribute of this large assembly, the wide spread sym pathy of all, the sincere grief of mourners, attest the immortality of good name. | But character, as faculties, is espec- ially undying. Benevolenee, beneflcence, coniugal, maternal and social affec- tion, patience, morality, fidelity, kind ness, industry helpfulness, these traits and many more have characterized the departed, whose character will be immor- tai as a geranium leaf in an album.
 Great as is our affliction, our consola- tion is also great. Mother and wife has died on the bosom of domestic affection, and attention. Many die away from
 home and far from friends. No friend lsponges away the death dew. No famil-
 far voice charms the mortal solitude
 But as the departed entered the mortal
 valley she is surrounded by the love and respect of the "dear ones" at home.
 Her sufferings were abbreviated both in duration and severity. As she had ex- lpressed her desire, so the Sable Reaper came. Nor was she without religious att must furnish the anchor of the soul. He who had aided her to lead a useful life
 was held up to her dying gaze, and she depressed confidence in her greatest
 friend. To us, this seems the greatest of all cancellations. For, there is home for the weary traveller, harbor where existence is no more billowed.
 Let us be admonished how transitory
 are all earthly things save good deeds, a
 noble character, and the deathless soul.
 How great is the necessity for constant preparation to depart. Suddenly the
 mother, with all the tender ties of life
 upon her, is removed from her place.
 With "girded loins" and "trimmed lamps
 let us await departure,