Читать книгу Stones of the Temple; Or, Lessons from the Fabric and Furniture of the Church - Field Walter - Страница 4

"When I am dead, then bury me in the sepulchre wherein the man of God is buried; lay my bones beside his bones."

1 Kings xiii. 31

"And so, Matthew, the old sexton's little daughter is to be buried to-day. What a calm peaceful day it is for her funeral! The day itself seems to have put on the same quiet happy smile that Lizzie Daniels always carried about with her, before she had that painful lingering sickness, which she bore with a meekness and patience I hardly ever saw equalled. And then it is Easter Day too, the very day one would choose for the burial of a good Christian child. All our services to-day will tell us that this little maid, and all those who lie around us here so still beneath their green mounds, are not dead but sleeping, and as our Saviour rose from the grave on Easter Day, so will they all awake and rise up again when God shall call them. I see the little grave is dug under the old yew-tree, near to that of your own dear ones. Lizzie was a great favourite of yours, was she not, Matthew?"

"Ah, she was the brightest little star in my sky, I can tell you, sir; and I shall miss her sadly. She brought me my dinner, every day for near two years, up to the old thorn there, and then she would sit down on the grass before me, and read from her Prayer Book some of the Psalms for the day; and when she had done, and I had kissed and thanked her, she used to go trotting home again, with, I believe, the brightest little face and the lightest little heart in England. Well, sir, it's sorry work, you know, for a man to dig the grave for his own child, and so I asked John Daniels to let me dig Lizzie's grave: but it has been indeed hard work for me, for I think I've shed more tears in that grave than I ever shed out of it. But the grave is all ready now, and little Lizzie will soon be there; and then, sir, I should like to put up a stone, for I shall often come here to think about the dear child. Poor little Lizzie! she seemed like a sort of good angel to me, – children do seem like that sometimes, don't they, sir? Perhaps, Mr. Ambrose, you would be so good as to tell Robert Atkinson what sort of stone you would like him to put up."

"Certainly I will; and I think nothing would be so suitable as a simple little stone cross, with Lizzie's name on the base of it. And as she is to be buried on Easter Day, I should like to add the words, 'In Christ shall all be made alive.'"

"Thank you, sir; that will do very nicely. I'm only thinking, may be, that wicked boy of Mr. Dole's, at the shop, will come some night and break the cross, as he did the one Mr. Hunter put up over his little boy. But I think that was more the sin of the father than of the son, for I'm told the old gentleman's very angry with you, sir, 'cause he couldn't put what he call's a 'handsome monument' over his father's grave; and he says, too, he's going to law about it."

"Ah, he'll be wiser not to do that, Matthew. The churchyard is the parson's freehold, and he has the power to prevent the erection of any stone there of which he disapproves; and I, for one, don't mean to give up this power. 'Tis true that every one of my parishioners has a right to be buried in this churchyard, nor could I refuse this if I would; but then, if I am to protect this right of my parishioners, as it is my duty to do, and to preserve my churchyard from disfigurement and desecration, I must take care that the ground is not occupied by such great ugly monuments as Mr. Dole wishes to build14. Why I hear he bought that large urn15 which was taken down from Mr. Acres' park gates, to put on the top of the tomb. And then I suppose he would like to have the sides covered with skulls and crossbones, and shovels and mattocks, and fat crying cherubs, besides the usual heathen devices, such as inverted torches and spent hour-glasses; all which fitly enough mark an infidel's burial-place, but not a Christian's. For you see, my friend, that none of these things represent any Christian truth; the best are but emblems of mortality; some are the symbols of oblivion and despair, and others but mimic a heathen custom long gone by. The stones of the churchyard ought themselves to tell the sanctity of the place, and that it is a Christian's rest16. The letters we carve on them will hardly be read by our children's children. The lines on that stone there tell no more than is true of all the Epitaphs around us:

But even then, if the symbol of our redemption is there, 'the very stones will cry out,' and though time-worn and moss-grown, will declare that it is a Christian's burial-place. If, then, as Christian men and women 'we sorrow not as others without hope,' let us not cover our monuments with every symbol of despair, or with heathen devices, but as we are not ashamed of the doctrine, so neither let us be ashamed of the symbol of the cross of Christ. Besides, if we wish to preserve our graves from desecration, this form of stone is the most likely to do so; for in spite of outrages like young Dole's, which have been sometimes committed, we continually find that such memorials have been respected and preserved when others have been removed and employed for common uses. Why, Matthew, I've seen hundreds of grave-stones converted into fire-hearths, door-steps, pavements, and such like, but I never saw a monument on which was graven the Christian symbol so desecrated; and I believe such a thing has hardly ever been seen by any one."

"Well, Mr. Ambrose, I should like there to be no doubt about little Lizzie's being a Christian's grave. I was thinking, too, to have a neat iron railing round the stone, sir."

"I would advise you not to have it, Matthew; for the grave will be prettier without it. Besides, it gives an idea of separateness, which one does not like in a place where all distinctions are done away with; and, moreover, the iron would soon rust, and then the railing would become very untidy."

"Yes, to be sure it would; I was forgetting that I shan't be here to keep it nicely painted: – but see, sir, here come the children from the village with their Easter flowers. I dare say little Mary Acres will give me some for Lizzie's grave."

"Ah, I like that good old custom of placing flowers and wreaths on Christian graves at Easter, and other special seasons17. It is the simple way in which these little ones both show their respect for departed friends, and express their belief in the resurrection of the dead. I would say of it, as Wordsworth wrote of the Funeral Chant: —

But you remember the time, Matthew, when there were very different scenes from this, at Easter, in St. Catherine's churchyard. If I mistake not, you will recollect when the Easter fair used to be kept here."

"That I do, sir, too well. There was always a Sunday fight in the churchyard, and the people used to come from Walesborough and for miles round to see it. It's just forty years ago to-day poor Bill Thirlsby was killed in a fight, as it might be, just where I'm now standing18. But, thank God, that day's gone by."

"And, I trust, never to come back again. But have you heard, Matthew, that some great enemies of the Church are trying to spoil the peace and sacredness of our churchyards in another way? They want to bring in all kinds of preachers to perform all sorts of funeral services in them; and if they gain their ends, our long-hallowed churchyards, where as yet there has only been heard the solemn beautiful Burial Service of our own Church, may be desecrated by the clamour of ignorant fanaticism, the continual janglings of religious discord, or perhaps, the open blasphemy of godless men."

"What! then I suppose we should have first a service from Master Scoff, the bill-sticker and Mormon preacher, and next from Master Scole, the Baptist preacher, then from Father La Trappe, the Roman Catholic minister, and then, perhaps, sir, it might be your turn. Why, sir, 'twould be almost like going back to the Easter fair."

"Well, my friend, in one respect it would be worse; for it would be discord all the year round. But I trust God will frustrate these wicked designs of our Church's foes. Long, long may it be ere the sanctity of our churchyards is thus invaded."

"Amen, say I to that, sir, with all my heart."

"And, thanks be to God, Matthew, that Amen of yours is now re-echoing loudly throughout the length and breadth of England."