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Show The Funeral of tlie Future. "Tho time is coming, " said an undertaker un-dertaker of New York city the other day, "when people will c ase to go to funerals in troops, and when the friends of the deceased will take farewell of the remains at his home, instead of following follow-ing him to the grave as they do now. This will be a decided change for the better. Funerals as now conducted are foolish and meaningless performances. They bring discomfort to all who attend at-tend them, and in many eases they do positivo injury. Think of the thousands thou-sands of people who catch their deaths of cold from standing shivering around an open grave and from sitting for hours in carriages traveling at a snail's pace for milos into the country. Of course the time is not far distant when burials will bo largely superseded by cremation. -On the whole, I am disposed to regard re-gard cremation as a blessing. People I are opposed to it now lwcauso they think that it is unnatural and horrible. It is simply an assistance to nature's work; it does neatly and quickly what nature accomplishes after a long time and in a very unpleasant fashion. I wonder if people will over realize that when a human being dies the body which he leaves behind him is not himself. him-self. There is no more relation between be-tween a man when he is living and when he is dead than there is between any living thing and a piece of clay. But we have not reached the stage of i civilization when the popular mind can grasp this fact. When wo do, there will be very different funeral cere-. cere-. monies from those now in vogue, and ' other methods of disposing of tho doad i will change materially." New York Telegram. |
