Funerary art

“ Thou art the whisper in the gloom,
The hinting tone, the haunting laugh:
Thou art the adorner of my tomb,
The minstrel of mine epitaph. ”

“ They are hideous Golgothas, these old intramural cemeteries of ours. In other cities the cemeteries are beautiful with all that the art of the gardener and the sculptor can give. ”

“ Then get thee gone, and dig my grave thyself,
And bid the merry bells ring to thine ear
That thou art crowned, not that I am dead. ”

“ Thy plot of grass is soft, and green as grass can be;
Rest, little young one, rest; what is’t that aileth thee?
What is it thou wouldst seek? what is wanting to thy heart?
Thy limbs are they not strong? And beautiful thou art:
This grass is tender grass; these flowers they have no peers;
And that green corn all day is rustling in thy ears!
If the sun be shining hot, do but stretch thy woollen chain;
This beech is standing by, its covert thou canst gain!
For rain and mountain storms, the like thou need’st not fear;
The rain and storm are things that scarcely can come here. ”

“ When the town is hushed and silent, in the death-like sleep of night, by the spell I have upon thee, by the love within thy heart, thou shalt feel my kisses falling like warm rain-drops on thy mouth; listen then, and hear me calling, calling thee as in a dream; drawing thee from out thy slumbers, by the magic of my art. Waken then. Oh! my beloved one, to enjoy the bliss of lust. Then from out thy open casement I shall creep upon thy couch; for I am the man created, to awaken thee to life. ”

“ The sculpture which adorns the graves of modern races in this country, generally represents urns, or weeping cherubims, broken flowers, or fractured columns, or grieving angels. These symbols of death and grief contrast often oddly with the hopeful scriptural sentences which they surmount. In some instances the occupation or calling of the deceased is typified on his tomb—the unstrung lyre telling the whereabouts of a dead musician; and a palette indicating the resting-place of a defunct painter. Little that is great in sculpture has of late marked burial-places. ”

“ I see yet that beauty of death! The highest achievements of sculpture are only the reminder of its severe sweetness. Then I remember the house all still and dark, — the people in their black clothes and dreary faces, — the scent of the newly-made coffin, — my being set up in a chair and detained by a gentle hand to hear the clergyman, — the carriages slowly going, the procession slowly doling out their steps to the grave. ”

“ And make Love a burial-place.
He is dead, dear, as you see,
And he wearies you and me.
Growing heavier, day by day,
Let us bury him, I say.
Wings of dead white butterflies,
These shall shroud him, as he lies
In his casket rich and rare,
Made of finest maiden-hair. ”

“ Our burial places abound in mortuary horrors which, with clumsy fingers, point in the assumed direction of immortality, inspiring hope in a future life by the thought that it, at worst, cannot contain ugliness to equal their own. ”

“ The keynote of his whole life was his art—whether consciously or not he acted up to the ideal of a perfect portrait-painter—whose business was not to criticise but to observe, not to direct but to reflect the currents of society. ‘I go,’ he said, ‘with the great stream of life.’ For the purpose of such a career the hours which he spent in his painting-room were not more profitable than those he spent out of it. ”

“ Every one knows the soul-subduing pathos of the funeral service, for who is so fortunate as never to have followed some one he has loved to the tomb? But when performed over the remains of innocence and beauty, thus laid low in the bloom of existence, what can be more affecting? At that simple but most solemn consignment of the body to the grave-“Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust!”—the tears of the youthful companions of the deceased flowed unrestrained. ”

“ I do not, indeed, wish to deny that there was one among them who was the first to begin, seeing that I know very well that it must needs be that at some time and from some one man there came the beginning; nor, also, will I deny that it may have been possible that one helped another and taught and opened the way to design, to colour, and relief, because I know that our art is all imitation, of nature for the most part and then, because a man cannot by himself rise so high, of those works that are executed by those whom he judges to be better masters than himself. ”

“ When all is over, when the absolving benediction has been pronounced, and death has triumphed where life took its last stand, the pale pulseless form, wrapped in its most costly vest, is dressed for burial. Wild-flowers are strewn on the dead by the Indian maiden, while the cliffs around mournfully echo back the funeral dirge. How true is human instinct to the awful mystery of the grave! ”

“ We felt that it was hard to lay in the grave the form of our dear friend; it was hard to part with the casket which had enshrined the precious jewel. Beautiful in life, she was so in death. The departing spirit had left a ray of brightness on its earthly house, and, in looking at the calm brow and peaceful smile, death seemed divested of its terror. We had twined the pure white flowers she loved around and amongst the rich dark masses of wavy hair, and she looked like a beautiful bride more than a tenant for the grave. The memory of that day will live ever in our minds. ”

“ The very bright red, again, is one of the ugliest warm colours that art ever stumbled upon: it is never mellowed by damp or anything else, and spoils everything near it by its intolerable and inevitable glare. ”

“ They saw many funerals everyday, and heard the murmur of the funeral service and the toll of the funeral bell whenever they went out, but it never occurred to them to think that tomb-stones were dismal or funerals impressive; they looked with cheerful living eyes at their natural surroundings, and never thought a bit more of the end of their own lives because they so constantly saw the end of other people’s. ”

“ Scarce any man, I believe, ever thought of that grave, that did not cast a flower of pity on it, and write over it a sweet epitaph. Gentle lady, so lovely, so loving, so unhappy! you have had countless champions; millions of manly hearts mourning for you. From generation to generation we take up the fond tradition of your beauty; we watch and follow your tragedy, your bright morning love and purity, your constancy, your grief, your sweet martyrdom. ”

“ The natural effect of sorrow over the dead is to refine and elevate the mind; and we have a proof of it in the purity of sentiment and the unaffected elegance of thought which pervaded the whole of these funeral observances. Thus it was an especial precaution that none but sweet-scented evergreens and flowers should be employed. The intention seems to have been to soften the horrors of the tomb, to beguile the mind from brooding over the disgraces of perishing mortality, and to associate the memory of the deceased with the most delicate and beautiful objects in nature. ”

“ A funeral procession is an imposing spectacle, and, to the uninstructed foreigner, a cheerful one; for there is nothing sad or sombre in the white, or bright-colored, robes of the priests, the white, tinsel-decorated bier, the red and white flags borne aloft, the enormous bunches of gay-colored flowers;—the very mourners in white silk, and with faces apparently unmoved by grief, bring no thought of the object of the procession to the Western mind. ”

“ No thought of physical corruption jars upon our memories of the dead. The opening words of the speaker are said, a hidden choir harmoniously chants of hope and life, and now the end has come. With the words ‘ashes to ashes’ a white pall is thrown over the dais, and we have looked upon our friend for the last time. The dais noiselessly sinks from sight, a short hour is spent in listening to a funeral oration, or in contemplation, until the dais, still covered with the pall, rises from below. ”

“ The one buried that day I had known, or she had known me in my boyhood, and it was expected that I would attend. My mother sent the wreath that belongs,—there is both sense and sentiment in flowers at a funeral when they are wreathed by the hands of those who loved the dead, as is still the custom here; none where they are bought at a florist's and paid for with a growl,—and we stood around the coffin and sang the old hymns, then walked behind it, two by two, men and women, to the grave, singing as we passed through the gate. ”

“ Lyricism of winter, murmur of funeral ribbons,
when the rushed parting now approaches;
prophesying voices in sad songs
that pray a farewell in the evening.
Vision of the burial of my hopes
in the very tomb of mortal injury.
Veronica charity of unknown regions,
where life is lost for the price of ether. ”

“ Whenever a corpse was borne along the street, in sunshine, rain, or snow, whether a pompous train, of the rich and proud, thronged after it, or few and humble were the mourners, behind them came the lonely woman, in a long, white garment, which the people called her shroud. She took no place among the kindred or the friends, but stood at the door to hear the funeral prayer, and walked in the rear of the procession, as one whose earthly charge it was to haunt the house of mourning, and be the shadow of affliction, and see that the dead were duly buried. ”

“ Death lifts them in one heave of the casket. More illuminating are the mourners. Dashing thru the sleet in brief poignancy; shrill, old voices that knew the deceased reciting what can only be the obvious. ”

“ The shaping power of the imagination has supplied the minor accessories of the story, and the dependents of the family delight to relate how that at midnight a muffled sound, as of a distant funeral peal, is often borne on the wind, and that at this time a shadowy procession of mourners may be seen wending its way towards the Knight's Low, bearing a coffin and pall, and followed by a lady arrayed in white and apparently in deep distress. ”

“ They felt that while following the coffin they had crossed the confines of life, and were already in the country of the dead. On their right stretched the yards of the marble-workers, the florists' shops which supplied wreaths for funerals, displays of potted flowers, and the economical furniture of tombs, zinc flower-stands, wreaths of immortelles in cement, and guardian angels in plaster. ”

“ Separated from the turmoil of human passion it touches the theme of humanity with a gracious tenderness that leans toward an elegant idealisation and to an attitude of feeling that is far less human than artistic. I would cite, as an illustration of what I am trying to express, the fact that Death has been symbolised by a woman of noble and inviting mien, whose arms might fold themselves around the young sculptor’s form as with a mother’s caress, while she pressed the poppies on his brow and wooed him to eternal sleep. ”

“ What happens in our graves poisons our thoughts together with our bodies. The figure of death, in the imagination of men, depends before all upon the form of burial; and the funeral rites govern not only the fate of those who depart but also the happiness of those who stay, for they raise in the ultimate background of life the great image upon which men’s eyes linger in consolation or despair. ”

“ You have probably never been to a funeral, and if so, you do not know the horrible sound of the first spadesful of earth as they fall, with dull blows, on that which is past feeling and resistance. The friends who stand round the grave shudder as each clod strikes the wood under which lies their beloved dead. Here it was different, for two men got into the grave and held up a grass mat, against which the earth was shovelled while the coffin was protected. ”

“ The day is fine and a ride to the out-of-town cemetery pleasant, and (to them) inexpensive; they whose eyes scarce rested with interest on the living form, gaze ceremoniously and curiously on the dead; the widow’s tears are counted, the mourning dresses of herself and children scrutinized; the prayer that always falls so immeasurably short of what critical ears demand, is said; a great silence—then a rustling—bustling—whispering—then the coffin is borne past the widow, who sees it through a mist of tears ”

“ Of course, all its points are not new, but old objections have been skillfully refurbished and new ones brought into play.
To mourn for the dead, is to mourn for the lost casket when you still retain the jewel it held. The memories of the dead one's virtues are the jewels, and the cold clay but the casket. ”

“ With the growing taste for privacy and simplicity, many of the foolish demonstrations of grief, expressed in outward display, have been eliminated. It is now a very rare occurrence for the room in which the dead body lies to be filled with wreaths and masses of flowers, for people are beginning to realize that this is a relic of ancient and savage burial customs, and that it is not so much a manifestation of grief as a display of vanity. ”

“ Most powerful of all in its favor is the prevention of premature burial. All these are on the side of cremation, and against it is but one—sentiment. It seems more beautiful to lay our friends to rest, softly pillowed, shrouded in satin, inclosed in rose-wood, covered with flowers, and of anything beyond we refuse to think. We erect the imposing marble, set out the blossoming plant, and carry flowers to the spot. The cemetery appeals more strongly to the sentiment than does the crematory. ”

“ Their bright hues and a child's beaming face are the only cheerful things which a mourner whose wounds are still bleeding freshly beside a coffin can endure to see, and I might compare flowers to the sound of bells. ”

“ Here and there the bulkhead of a well-to-do member of society was entirely covered by a painting depicting the untold grief of those left behind,—in most cases a picture of the coffin of the deceased, with a string of 444his male relatives and friends on one side and the female mourners opposite, all dressed in their most correct attire—or the best the painter could furnish them from his palette—and standing exact distances apart in exactly the same attitude of weeping copiously into a large handkerchief á dos reales in any shop. ”