The Irish standard., 1903-04-04
PURELY PAGAN
Is the Display of Flowers at Funerals
Saws the Tablet.

Is the Display of Flowers at Funerals,
Saws the Tablet.
Way out in New Zealand, people
make foolish display ut funerals. They
marshall carriages by the score, and
pile up flowers by the cartload. The
folly of this practice is we'll pointed
out by the Tablet, one of the best ell
tied Catholic papers in the world
Read this article and reflect:
The report of the Reform of Funcr-
ais association. which was presented
at the annual meeting held the other
day in London. brings home to us the
fact that though the special evils
which the association set itself to
combat are dead or dying, new and
prctticr and therefore more trouble
some abuses are taking Their places
Ii was, we think, a Texan town that
Witnessed once on a time, the strange
spectacle OF a clown. in paint patches
and baggy pantaloons. weeping honest
tears at the funeral of an eccentric
bencfactor. The idea was incongru-
GUS to Il degree; but there was, we
wccn, far less of essential folly in the
spectacle tnan there is in many of the
strange absurditics that custom now
sanctions in the house of mourning
and by the grnvesidc of the dead.
There is neither common sense nor
Christian feeling in these exhibitions
Of foolish pride that %orips i'm IL few
hours Of vulgar and wastcful. of we'll
meant displays of seeming wealth.
There is as little of either in the pres
ent cumbersome displays of flowers at
funerals. against which this assoca-
ton, befOrenamed is inluy,rat'ng an
active crusade. This custom is con-
dcmncd by positive ecclesiastical en-
actments in Australia ana the United
States. 1t is strongly discouraged in
the DEGREES of the first provincial syn
Cd of Wellington. all it /. opposed to
Catholic feeling. The cHStOm was or
iginally pagan. The ancient Greeks
bcdccked their dead with flowers But
in the early days of the catacombs,
and in every time and place in which
the spirit of the Catholi" liturgy has
! been carried out neither wrcaths nor
flowers ever surrounded the bodies OF
the dead, Flowers have been Aptly
styled "naturc's SMILES" They are the
| cmblcms of sweetness and brightness
and joy They deck tho brow of the
ncwly-wcddcd bride. They appear at
every festival. and-as we said some
| time ago in a brief note upon this sub
| ject-they arc as out Of tune in a place
of weeping as Il step dance, or as the
paint and patches and baggy rabil-
mcntS of the clown ut the Texan fun
eral. "The dominant note of the CHRIS,
tian DEATH" said Canon Moscr some
years ago. sis fear and Supplcation
an acknowledgment Of the awful
rigOrs of Gods inscrutible Justice
tempered with confidence in the merits
OF Ills dolorous passion. SO long as
the Church is not certain that hcl
children have arrived ut heavens gate
she has not the heart to rejoice. Ant
therefore it is that hOwers-naturc'.
symbols of ioy--at modern intcrments
are in fragrant contradiction with tn,
spirit of the liturgy.
The custom of decking the death
chamber and the grave with flower.
seems to have received cOnsiderabl,
impetus in England after the Reform
ation-perhaps as a substitute for tin
solemnities of the old Catholic Iiturg,
which We're locked by act of parlia
ment. Sir Thomas Overbury tells. 70
instance. Of the ''faire and happy milk
maid" shat 'all her care is that sh
} may die in the spring-time, to hav
! store Of flowers stuck upon her wind
| ing sheet" Shakespeare makes tn
: queen in Hamlet scatter flowers owe
the grave of Ophelia and Arviragl
| and Relarius strew with pale primros
) and azure hare-bell and leaf of eglar
tin the tomb Of the hapless Imogen,
, Herricli and others tuned their Tyre
5 and canonizcd the custom in more c
less successful verse. But it require
e a stronger tonic than Herrick's "Dira
= of Jeptha" of. the splay-foot lines c
t the lesser rhymsters to keep the GU
: tom alive: and when Washington IT.,
e ing wrote his "Sketch-book"
+ appeared in 1S20-he said that ii
e custom was "only met with in I'll