Reflections on visiting the Grave of a Child.

IN the spring of the last year I attended the funeral of a child; one that I had often seen the parents gaze upon with an expression of deep delight, and seemingly without the least consciousness that it was not an immortal thing. I could understand their happiness, but not their security for I had shared that calamity, from which life is not free, and with a heavy but I trust an humble heart, had laid my treasure in the dust. I was prepared therefore to sympathize with them, "tear for tear." But in truth, the heart most acquainted with grief must have been moved at the sight of a child, beautiful as the morning star, called away from his parents' care and tenderness, and soon to lay his head on a colder pillow than his mother's breast. The scene was impressive, even awful; the stillness of the mansion which had wrung with his laugh of gladness; the parents wrapt in unutterable wo; the children gazing with wonder and awe on the

mystery of death; and old men, each pondering as he leaned on his staff, why so lovely a form should be created only, as it seemed, to be dashed in pieces; all was silence, thoughtfulness, and death. In the midst of them lay the child, once so tender and helpless, now insensible to all human affections. His features bore that unsearchable depth of expression which no mortal eye could read; there was a smile on his lips, and a clear radiance on his brow, that made all who beheld it feel the unapproachable majesty of death. Soon the melancholy bell, the returning procession, and the tomb closing on its creaking hinges, told me that he had passed the boundary that separated the living from the dead.

In the autumn, I happened to visit the burial-place. This is a favorite retreat of the thoughtful; t has a solitude of its own, neither dreary nor oppressive; a holy and gentle stillness, which is felt by every one that passes by. It was in a season of the day and year auspicious to such influences; the red leaves were just beginning to wither and fall; the breathing of Nature was like a universal sigh; the evening clouds were hurrying to the west, to float once more in the sunset radiance; and all was still, as the

decay that wears the marble of the tombs. The pale monuments rose around me, telling of the dead, not so much what they were, as what they ought to have been. But I was less moved by all their legends of vanity or affection, than by one small stone, which hardly rose above its bed of green. It was the memorial of that child who perished in the infancy and innocency of existence; leaving no more traces of himself among the living, than the cloud that wanders and melts away in the blue of heaven.

I could not help meditating on the effect of time. At the time when the leaves which I saw falling around me were opening, this child was in the brightness of its rising. Now, it was gathered, "dust to dust;" then, it was taken from the living, and the parents refused all comfort, both of God and man. Now, most of those who shed tears for his early departure had forgotten where they had laid him; and the parents themselves treasured his memory with far more tenderness than gloom. Had they not the same consolations then? Had any visible angel, since, said to them that he was not here, but had risen? Was not the Sun of righteousness shining as brilliantly then upon the world

as now? I felt that time had done what religion then could not do: what religion might then have done, had it been intimate in the heart. For it was designed to remove the terrors of the grave; and instead of throwing ourselves open to the accidents and misfortunes of life, we should take the consolation God has offered, and bind it to our souls. We should not allow ourselves to be entirely passive in the day of trial. We should exert all the energy of our nature, touched and quickened by religion. If our hearts are strung to the trials of life, like the fine instrument, their tones will be inspiring; but give them up to the influences of the world, and they are all sadness, like the harp of the winds, on which the passing breeze makes what melody it will.

And yet it would seem as if the anguish of sorrow was almost as deep, as if our religion never had come. The tears flow as fast and freely as they did two thousand years ago; but then immortality was like some star which shone unregarded in the heaven. Now, its periods have been measured its vastness revealed; and it has been made a guide to wanderers on the sea. Still we regard the future with uneasiness and dread;

we set our affections on perishing things, and are miserable when we lose them. When our friends are living and happy, we feel as if they were immortal; when they are gone, we mourn for them as if they were lost for ever.

I saw the book of Nature spread open before me, as I stood in this place of death; and it seemed as if I could read better things on its illuminated page. It is a revelation of God, like christianity. If our Saviour told his disciples to gather instruction from the lowly flowers, there must be something taught in the grand and beautiful works of God. I cannot believe that the sun and moon have shone six thousand years merely to enlighten the world; or that the planets wheel through their bewildering paths only to gladden the eye with their beauty. These things have a holier purpose, a religious design. We see that not a leaf fades till the purpose of its existence is fulfilled; and then we learn that the infant cannot perish, though in the sight of men it seems to die. "He asked life of thee, and thou gavest it him; even length of days for ever and ever." All this is more than confirmed by christianity; and religion hardly acknowledges such a thing as death; for there is no such thing as death to the