by Sir Thomas Browne

Hydriotaphia, or Urn-Burial (1658) is Sir Thomas Browne's meditation on death, burial customs, and the transience of all human memorials. Prompted by the discovery of ancient funeral urns near Walsingham in Norfolk, the work moves from archaeological observation through the burial practices of every known civilisation to a final chapter that is one of the most celebrated passages in English prose — a soaring meditation on mortality, oblivion, and the only immortality that matters.

Browne (1605–1682) was a Norwich physician whose curiosity ranged from medicine to natural philosophy to theology. Where his Religio Medici (1643) confessed his faith, the Hydriotaphia confronts its limits: "There is nothing strictly immortal, but immortality." The prose reaches heights that Johnson, Lamb, and De Quincey all acknowledged as unsurpassed in English.

This text reproduces the folio edition of 1686, from the edition prepared by J. W. Willis Bund (Sampson Low, London, 1869). Editorial notes have been removed.

Epistle Dedicatory

To my worthy and honoured friend, Thomas Le Gros, of Crostwick, Esquire.

When the general pyre was out, and the last valediction over, men
took a lasting adieu of their interred friends, little expecting the
curiosity of future ages should comment upon their ashes; and, having
no old experience of the duration of their relicks, held no opinion of
such after-considerations.

But who knows the fate of his bones, or how often he is to be buried?
Who hath the oracle of his ashes, or whither they are to be scattered?
The relicks of many lie like the ruins of Pompey’s, in all parts of
the earth; and when they arrive at your hands these may seem to have
wandered far, who, in a direct and meridian travel, have but few
miles of known earth between yourself and the pole.

That the bones of Theseus should be seen again in Athens was not
beyond conjecture and hopeful expectation: but that these should arise
so opportunely to serve yourself was an hit of fate, and honour beyond
prediction.

We cannot but wish these urns might have the effect of theatrical
vessels and great Hippodrome urns in Rome, to resound the
acclamations and honour due unto you. But these are sad and sepulchral
pitchers, which have no joyful voices; silently expressing old
mortality, the ruins of forgotten times, and can only speak with life,
how long in this corruptible frame some parts may be uncorrupted; yet
able to outlast bones long unborn, and noblest pile among us.
And so run up your thoughts upon the ancient of days, the
antiquary’s truest object, unto whom the eldest parcels are young, and
earth itself an infant, and without Egyptian account makes but small
noise in thousands.

We were hinted by the occasion, not catched the opportunity to write
of old things, or intrude upon the antiquary. We are coldly drawn unto
discourses of antiquities, who have scarce time before us to comprehend
new things, or make out learned novelties. But seeing they arose, as
they lay almost in silence among us, at least in short account suddenly
passed over, we were very unwilling they should die again, and be
buried twice among us.

Beside, to preserve the living, and make the dead to live, to keep
men out of their urns, and discourse of human fragments in them, is
not impertinent unto our profession; whose study is life and death,
who daily behold examples of mortality, and of all men least need
artificial mementos, or coffins by our bedside, to mind us of our
graves.

’Tis time to observe occurrences, and let nothing remarkable escape us:
the supinity of elder days hath left so much in silence, or time hath
so martyred the records, that the most industrious heads do find no
easy work to erect a new Britannia.

’Tis opportune to look back upon old times, and contemplate our
forefathers. Great examples grow thin, and to be fetched from the
passed world. Simplicity flies away, and iniquity comes at long strides
upon us. We have enough to do to make up ourselves from present and
passed times, and the whole stage of things scarce serveth for our
instruction. A complete piece of virtue must be made from the Centos
of all ages, as all the beauties of Greece could make but one handsome
Venus.

When the bones of King Arthur were digged up, the old race might
think they beheld therein some originals of themselves; unto these
of our urns none here can pretend relation, and can only behold the
relicks of those persons who, in their life giving the laws unto their
predecessors, after long obscurity, now lie at their mercies. But,
remembering the early civility they brought upon these countries, and
forgetting long-passed mischiefs, we mercifully preserve their bones,
and piss not upon their ashes.

In the offer of these antiquities we drive not at ancient families,
so long outlasted by them. We are far from erecting your worth upon
the pillars of your forefathers, whose merits you illustrate. We
honour your old virtues, conformable unto times before you, which are
the noblest armoury. And, having long experience of your friendly
conversation, void of empty formality, full of freedom, constant and
generous honesty, I look upon you as a gem of the old rock, and
must profess myself even to urn and ashes.—Your ever faithful Friend
and Servant,
Thomas Browne.
Norwich, May 1st.

Chapter I

In the deep discovery of the subterranean world a shallow part would
satisfy some inquirers; who, if two or three yards were open about the
surface, would not care to rake the bowels of Potosi, and regions
toward the centre. Nature hath furnished one part of the earth, and man
another. The treasures of time lie high, in urns, coins, and monuments,
scarce below the roots of some vegetables. Time hath endless rarities,
and shows of all varieties; which reveals old things in heaven, makes
new discoveries in earth, and even earth itself a discovery. That great
antiquity America lay buried for thousands of years, and a large part
of the earth is still in the urn unto us.

Though if Adam were made out of an extract of the earth, all parts
might challenge a restitution, yet few have returned their bones far
lower than they might receive them; not affecting the graves of giants,
under hilly and heavy coverings, but content with less than their
own depth, have wished their bones might lie soft, and the earth be
light upon them. Even such as hope to rise again, would not be content
with central interment, or so desperately to place their relicks as
to lie beyond discovery; and in no way to be seen again; which happy
contrivance hath made communication with our forefathers, and left unto
our view some parts, which they never beheld themselves.

Though earth hath engrossed the name, yet water hath proved the
smartest grave; which in forty days swallowed almost mankind, and the
living creation; fishes not wholly escaping, except the salt ocean were
handsomely contempered by a mixture of the fresh element.

Many have taken voluminous pains to determine the state of the soul
upon disunion; but men have been most phantastical in the singular
contrivances of their corporal dissolution: whilst the soberest nations
have rested in two ways, of simple inhumation and burning.

That carnal interment or burying was of the elder date, the old
examples of Abraham and the patriarchs are sufficient to illustrate;
and were without competition, if it could be made out that Adam was
buried near Damascus, or Mount Calvary, according to some tradition.
God himself, that buried but one, was pleased to make choice of this
way, collectible from Scripture expression, and the hot contest between
Satan and the archangel about discovering the body of Moses. But the
practice of burning was also of great antiquity, and of no slender
extent. For (not to derive the same from Hercules) noble descriptions
there are hereof in the Grecian funerals of Homer, in the formal
obsequies of Patroclus and Achilles; and somewhat elder in the Theban
war, and solemn combustion of Meneceus, and Archemorus, contemporary
unto Jair the eighth judge of Israel. Confirmable also among the
Trojans, from the funeral pyre of Hector, burnt before the gates of
Troy: and the burning of Penthesilea the Amazonian queen: and long
continuance of that practice, in the inward countries of Asia; while as
low as the reign of Julian, we find that the king of Chionia burnt
the body of his son, and interred the ashes in a silver urn.

The same practice extended also far west; and besides Herulians, Getes,
and Thracians, was in use with most of the Celtæ, Sarmatians, Germans,
Gauls, Danes, Swedes, Norwegians; not to omit some use thereof among
Carthaginians and Americans. Of greater antiquity among the Romans
than most opinion, or Pliny seems to allow: for (besides the old table
laws of burning or burying within the city, of making the funeral
fire with planed wood, or quenching the fire with wine), Manlius the
consul burnt the body of his son: Numa, by special clause of his will,
was not burnt but buried; and Remus was solemnly burned, according to
the description of Ovid.
“Ultima prolata subdita flamma rogo,” &c. Fast., lib. iv., 856.

Cornelius Sylla was not the first whose body was burned in Rome, but
the first of the Cornelian family; which being indifferently, not
frequently used before; from that time spread, and became the prevalent
practice. Not totally pursued in the highest run of cremation; for
when even crows were funerally burnt, Poppæa the wife of Nero found a
peculiar grave interment. Now as all customs were founded upon some
bottom of reason, so there wanted not grounds for this; according
to several apprehensions of the most rational dissolution. Some
being of the opinion of Thales, that water was the original of all
things, thought it most equal to submit unto the principle of
putrefaction, and conclude in a moist relentment. Others conceived
it most natural to end in fire, as due unto the master principle in the
composition, according to the doctrine of Heraclitus; and therefore
heaped up large piles, more actively to waft them toward that element,
whereby they also declined a visible degeneration into worms, and left
a lasting parcel of their composition.

Some apprehended a purifying virtue in fire, refining the grosser
commixture, and firing out the æthereal particles so deeply immersed
in it. And such as by tradition or rational conjecture held any hint
of the final pyre of all things; or that this element at last must be
too hard for all the rest; might conceive most naturally of the fiery
dissolution. Others pretending no natural grounds, politickly declined
the malice of enemies upon their buried bodies. Which consideration led
Sylla unto this practice; who having thus served the body of Marius,
could not but fear a retaliation upon his own; entertained after in the
civil wars, and revengeful contentions of Rome.

But as many nations embraced, and many left it indifferent, so others
too much affected, or strictly declined this practice. The Indian
Brachmans seemed too great friends unto fire, who burnt themselves
alive and thought it the noblest way to end their days in fire;
according to the expression of the Indian, burning himself at Athens,
in his last words upon the pyre unto the amazed spectators, “thus I
make myself immortal.”
the total destruction in this kind of
death, which happened to Ajax Oileus.

The old Balearians had a peculiar mode, for they used great urns and
much wood, but no fire in their burials, while they bruised the flesh
and bones of the dead, crowded them into urns, and laid heaps of wood
upon them. And the Chinese without cremation or urnal interment of
their bodies, make use of trees and much burning, while they plant a
pine-tree by their grave, and burn great numbers of printed draughts
of slaves and horses over it, civilly content with their companies in
effigy, which barbarous nations exact unto reality.

Christians abhorred this way of obsequies, and though they sticked
not to give their bodies to be burnt in their lives, detested that
mode after death: affecting rather a depositure than absumption, and
properly submitting unto the sentence of God, to return not unto
ashes but unto dust again, and conformable unto the practice of the
patriarchs, the interment of our Saviour, of Peter, Paul, and the
ancient martyrs. And so far at last declining promiscuous interment
with Pagans, that some have suffered ecclesiastical censures, for
making no scruple thereof.

The Mussulman believers will never admit this fiery resolution. For
they hold a present trial from their black and white angels in the
grave; which they must have made so hollow, that they may rise upon
their knees.

The Jewish nation, though they entertained the old way of inhumation,
yet sometimes admitted this practice. For the men of Jabesh burnt
the body of Saul; and by no prohibited practice, to avoid contagion
or pollution, in time of pestilence, burnt the bodies of their
friends. And when they burnt not their dead bodies, yet sometimes
used great burnings near and about them, deducible from the expressions
concerning Jehoram, Zedechias, and the sumptuous pyre of Asa. And were
so little averse from Pagan burning, that the Jews lamenting the death
of Cæsar their friend, and revenger on Pompey, frequented the place
where his body was burnt for many nights together. And as they raised
noble monuments and mausoleums for their own nation, so they were
not scrupulous in erecting some for others, according to the practice
of Daniel, who left that lasting sepulchral pile in Ecbatana, for the
Median and Persian kings.

κατασκεύασμα θαυμασίως πεποιημένον, whereof a Jewish priest had
always custody until Josephus’ days.—Jos. Antiq., lib. x.

But even in times of subjection and hottest use, they conformed not
unto the Roman practice of burning; whereby the prophecy was secured
concerning the body of Christ, that it should not see corruption, or
a bone should not be broken; which we believe was also providentially
prevented, from the soldier’s spear and nails that passed by the little
bones both in his hands and feet; not of ordinary contrivance, that
it should not corrupt on the cross, according to the laws of Roman
crucifixion, or an hair of his head perish, though observable in Jewish
customs, to cut the hair of malefactors.

Nor in their long cohabitation with Egyptians, crept into a custom of
their exact embalming, wherein deeply slashing the muscles, and taking
out the brains and entrails, they had broken the subject of so entire a
resurrection, nor fully answered the types of Enoch, Elijah, or Jonah,
which yet to prevent or restore, was of equal facility unto that rising
power able to break the fasciations and bands of death, to get clear
out of the cerecloth, and an hundred pounds of ointment, and out of the
sepulchre before the stone was rolled from it.

But though they embraced not this practice of burning, yet entertained
they many ceremonies agreeable unto Greek and Roman obsequies. And
he that observeth their funeral feasts, their lamentations at the
grave, their music, and weeping mourners; how they closed the eyes of
their friends, how they washed, anointed, and kissed the dead; may
easily conclude these were not mere Pagan civilities. But whether
that mournful burthen, and treble calling out after Absalom, had any
reference unto the last conclamation, and triple valediction, used by
other nations, we hold but a wavering conjecture.

Civilians make sepulture but of the law of nations, others do
naturally found it and discover it also in animals. They that are so
thick-skinned as still to credit the story of the Phœnix, may say
something for animal burning. More serious conjectures find some
examples of sepulture in elephants, cranes, the sepulchral cells of
pismires, and practice of bees,—which civil society carrieth out their
dead, and hath exequies, if not interments.

Chapter II

THE solemnities, ceremonies, rites of their cremation or interment,
so solemnly delivered by authors, we shall not disparage our reader
to repeat. Only the last and lasting part in their urns, collected
bones and ashes, we cannot wholly omit or decline that subject, which
occasion lately presented, in some discovered among us.

In a field of Old Walsingham, not many months past, were digged up
between forty and fifty urns, deposited in a dry and sandy soil, not a
yard deep, nor far from one another.—Not all strictly of one figure,
but most answering these described; some containing two pounds of
bones, and teeth, with fresh impressions of their combustion; besides
the extraneous substances, like pieces of small boxes, or combs
handsomely wrought, handles of small brass instruments, brazen nippers,
and in one some kind of opal.

Near the same plot of ground, for about six yards compass, were digged
up coals and incinerated substances, which begat conjecture that this
was the ustrina or place of burning their bodies, or some sacrificing
place unto the Manes, which was properly below the surface of the
ground, as the aræ and altars unto the gods and heroes above it.

That these were the urns of Romans from the common custom and place
where they were found, is no obscure conjecture, not far from a Roman
garrison, and but five miles from Brancaster, set down by ancient
record under the name of Branodunum. And where the adjoining town,
containing seven parishes, in no very different sound, but Saxon
termination, still retains the name of Burnham, which being an early
station, it is not improbable the neighbour parts were filled with
habitations, either of Romans themselves, or Britons Romanized, which
observed the Roman customs.

Nor is it improbable, that the Romans early possessed this country.
For though we meet not with such strict particulars of these parts
before the new institution of Constantine and military charge of the
count of the Saxon shore, and that about the Saxon invasions, the
Dalmatian horsemen were in the garrison of Brancaster; yet in the time
of Claudius, Vespasian, and Severus, we find no less than three legions
dispersed through the province of Britain. And as high as the reign
of Claudius a great overthrow was given unto the Iceni, by the Roman
lieutenant Ostorius. Not long after, the country was so molested, that,
in hope of a better state, Prastaagus bequeathed his kingdom unto Nero
and his daughters; and Boadicea, his queen, fought the last decisive
battle with Paulinus. After which time, and conquest of Agricola, the
lieutenant of Vespasian, probable it is, they wholly possessed this
country; ordering it into garrisons or habitations best suitable with
their securities. And so some Roman habitations not improbable in these
parts, as high as the time of Vespasian, where the Saxons after seated,
in whose thin-filled maps we yet find the name of Walsingham. Now if
the Iceni were but Gammadims, Anconians, or men that lived in an angle,
wedge, or elbow of Britain, according to the original etymology, this
country will challenge the emphatical appellation, as most properly
making the elbow or iken of Icenia.

That Britain was notably populous is undeniable, from that expression
of Cæsar. That the Romans themselves were early in no small
numbers—seventy thousand, with their associates, slain, by Boadicea,
affords a sure account. And though not many Roman habitations are now
known, yet some, by old works, rampiers, coins, and urns, do testify
their possessions. Some urns have been found at Castor, some also
about Southcreak, and, not many years past, no less than ten in a
field at Buxton, not near any recorded garrison. Nor is it strange to
find Roman coins of copper and silver among us; of Vespasian, Trajan,
Adrian, Commodus, Antoninus, Severus, &c.; but the greater number of
Dioclesian, Constantine, Constans, Valens, with many of Victorinus
Posthumius, Tetricus, and the thirty tyrants in the reign of Gallienus;
and some as high as Adrianus have been found about Thetford, or
Sitomagus, mentioned in the Itinerary of Antoninus, as the way from
Venta or Castor unto London. But the most frequent discovery is made at
the two Castors by Norwich and Yarmouth at Burghcastle, and Brancaster.
And we find a passage in Sidonius, which
asserteth that practice in France unto a lower account. And, perhaps,
not fully disused till Christianity fully established, which gave the
final extinction to these sepulchral bonfires.

Whether they were the bones of men, or women, or children, no authentic
decision from ancient custom in distinct places of burial. Although not
improbably conjectured, that the double sepulture, or burying-place of
Abraham, had in it such intention. But from exility of bones, thinness
of skulls, smallness of teeth, ribs, and thigh-bones, not improbable
that many thereof were persons of minor age, or woman. Confirmable also
from things contained in them. In most were found substances resembling
combs, plates like boxes, fastened with iron pins, and handsomely
overwrought like the necks or bridges of musical instruments; long
brass plates overwrought like the handles of neat implements; brazen
nippers, to pull away hair; and in one a kind of opal, yet maintaining
a bluish colour.

Now that they accustomed to burn or bury with them, things wherein
they excelled, delighted, or which were dear unto them, either as
farewells unto all pleasure, or vain apprehension that they might use
them in the other world, is testified by all antiquity, observable
from the gem or beryl ring upon the finger of Cynthia, the mistress of
Propertius, when after her funeral pyre her ghost appeared unto him;
and notably illustrated from the contents of that Roman urn preserved
by Cardinal Farnese, wherein besides great number of gems with heads
of gods and goddesses, were found an ape of agath, a grasshopper, an
elephant of amber, a crystal ball, three glasses, two spoons, and
six nuts of crystal; and beyond the content of urns, in the monument
of Childerick the first, and fourth king from Pharamond, casually
discovered three years past at Tournay, restoring unto the world much
gold richly adorning his sword, two hundred rubies, many hundred
imperial coins, three hundred golden bees, the bones and horse-shoes of
his horse interred with him, according to the barbarous magnificence
of those days in their sepulchral obsequies. Although, if we steer by
the conjecture of many a Septuagint expression, some trace thereof may
be found even with the ancient Hebrews, not only from the sepulchral
treasure of David, but the circumcision knives which Joshua also buried.

Some men, considering the contents of these urns, lasting pieces and
toys included in them, and the custom of burning with many other
nations, might somewhat doubt whether all urns found among us, were
properly Roman relicks, or some not belonging unto our British, Saxon,
or Danish forefathers.

In the form of burial among the ancient Britons, the large discourses
of Cæsar, Tacitus, and Strabo are silent. For the discovery whereof,
with other particulars, we much deplore the loss of that letter which
Cicero expected or received from his brother Quintus, as a resolution
of British customs; or the account which might have been made by
Scribonius Largus, the physician, accompanying the Emperor Claudius,
who might have also discovered that frugal bit of the old Britons,
which in the bigness of a bean could satisfy their thirst and hunger.

But that the Druids and ruling priests used to burn and bury, is
expressed by Pomponius; that Bellinus, the brother of Brennus, and King
of the Britons, was burnt, is acknowledged by Polydorus, as also by
Amandus Zierexensis in Historia and Pineda in his Universa Historia
(Spanish). That they held that practice in Gallia, Cæsar expressly
delivereth. Whether the Britons (probably descended from them, of like
religion, language, and manners) did not sometimes make use of burning,
or whether at least such as were after civilized unto the Roman life
and manners, conformed not unto this practice, we have no historical
assertion or denial. But since, from the account of Tacitus, the Romans
early wrought so much civility upon the British stock, that they
brought them to build temples, to wear the gown, and study the Roman
laws and language, that they conformed also unto their religious rites
and customs in burials, seems no improbable conjecture.

That burning the dead was used in Sarmatia is affirmed by Gaguinus;
that the Sueons and Gathlanders used to burn their princes and great
persons, is delivered by Saxo and Olaus; that this was the old German
practice, is also asserted by Tacitus. And though we are bare in
historical particulars of such obsequies in this island, or that the
Saxons, Jutes, and Angles burnt their dead, yet came they from parts
where ’twas of ancient practice; the Germans using it, from whom they
were descended. And even in Jutland and Sleswick in Anglia Cymbrica,
urns with bones were found not many years before us.

But the Danish and northern nations have raised an era or point of
compute from their custom of burning their dead: some deriving it from
Unguinus, some from Frotho the great, who ordained by law, that princes
and chief commanders should be committed unto the fire, though the
common sort had the common grave interment. So Starkatterus, that old
hero, was burnt, and Ringo royally burnt the body of Harold the king
slain by him.

What time this custom generally expired in that nation, we discern no
assured period; whether it ceased before Christianity, or upon their
conversion, by Ausgurius the Gaul, in the time of Ludovicus Pius, the
son of Charles the Great, according to good computes; or whether it
might not be used by some persons, while for an hundred and eighty
years Paganism and Christianity were promiscuously embraced among
them, there is no assured conclusion. About which times the Danes were
busy in England, and particularly infested this country; where many
castles and strongholds were built by them, or against them, and great
number of names and families still derived from them. But since this
custom was probably disused before their invasion or conquest, and the
Romans confessedly practised the same since their possession of this
island, the most assured account will fall upon the Romans, or Britons
Romanized.

However, certain it is, that urns conceived of no Roman original, are
often digged up both in Norway and Denmark, handsomely described, and
graphically represented by the learned physician Wormius. And in some
parts of Denmark in no ordinary number, as stands delivered by authors
exactly describing those countries. And they contained not only bones,
but many other substances in them, as knives, pieces of iron, brass,
and wood, and one of Norway a brass gilded jew’s-harp.

Nor were they confused or careless in disposing the noblest sort,
while they placed large stones in circle about the urns or bodies
which they interred: somewhat answerable unto the monument of Rollrich
stones in England, or sepulchral monument probably erected by Rollo,
who after conquered Normandy; where ’tis not improbable somewhat might
be discovered. Meanwhile to what nation or person belonged that large
urn found at Ashbury, containing mighty bones, and a buckler; what
those large urns found at Little Massingham; or why the Anglesea
urns are placed with their mouths downward, remains yet undiscovered.

Chapter III

PLAISTERED and whited sepulchres were anciently affected in cadaverous
and corrupted burials; and the rigid Jews were wont to garnish the
sepulchres of the righteous. Ulysses, in Hecuba, cared not how
meanly he lived, so he might find a noble tomb after death.
Great princes affected great monuments; and the fair and larger urns
contained no vulgar ashes, which makes that disparity in those which
time discovereth among us. The present urns were not of one capacity,
the largest containing above a gallon, some not much above half that
measure; nor all of one figure, wherein there is no strict conformity
in the same or different countries; observable from those represented
by Casalius, Bosio, and others, though all found in Italy; while many
have handles, ears, and long necks, but most imitate a circular figure,
in a spherical and round composure; whether from any mystery, best
duration or capacity, were but a conjecture. But the common form with
necks was a proper figure, making our last bed like our first; nor
much unlike the urns of our nativity while we lay in the nether part
of the earth, and inward vault of our microcosm. Many urns are
red, these but of a black colour somewhat smooth, and dully sounding,
which begat some doubt, whether they were burnt, or only baked in
oven or sun, according to the ancient way, in many bricks, tiles,
pots, and testaceous works; and, as the word testa is properly to
be taken, when occurring without addition and chiefly intended by
Pliny, when he commendeth bricks and tiles of two years old, and to
make them in the spring. Nor only these concealed pieces, but the open
magnificence of antiquity, ran much in the artifice of clay. Hereof the
house of Mausolus was built, thus old Jupiter stood in the Capitol,
and the statua of Hercules, made in the reign of Tarquinius Priscus,
was extant in Pliny’s days. And such as declined burning or funeral
urns, affected coffins of clay, according to the mode of Pythagoras, a
way preferred by Varro. But the spirit of great ones was above these
circumscriptions, affecting copper, silver, gold, and porphyry urns,
wherein Severus lay, after a serious view and sentence on that which
should contain him. Some of these urns were thought to have been
silvered over, from sparklings in several pots, with small tinsel
parcels; uncertain whether from the earth, or the first mixture in them.

Among these urns we could obtain no good account of their coverings;
only one seemed arched over with some kind of brickwork. Of those found
at Buxton, some were covered with flints, some, in other parts, with
tiles; those at Yarmouth Caster were closed with Roman bricks, and
some have proper earthen covers adapted and fitted to them. But in the
Homerical urn of Patroclus, whatever was the solid tegument, we find
the immediate covering to be a purple piece of silk: and such as had
no covers might have the earth closely pressed into them, after which
disposure were probably some of these, wherein we found the bones and
ashes half mortared unto the sand and sides of the urn, and some long
roots of quich, or dog’s-grass, wreathed about the bones.

No Lamps, included liquors, lacrymatories, or tear bottles, attended
these rural urns, either as sacred unto the manes, or passionate
expressions of their surviving friends. While with rich flames, and
hired tears, they solemnized their obsequies, and in the most lamented
monuments made one part of their inscriptions. Some find sepulchral
vessels containing liquors, which time hath incrassated into jellies.
For, besides these lacrymatories, notable lamps, with vessels of
oils, and aromatical liquors, attended noble ossuaries; and some yet
retaining a vinosity and spirit in them, which, if any have tasted,
they have far exceeded the palates of antiquity. Liquors not to be
computed by years of annual magistrates, but by great conjunctions and
the fatal periods of kingdoms. The draughts of consulary date were
but crude unto these, and Opimian wine but in the must unto them.

In sundry graves and sepulchres we meet with rings, coins, and
chalices. Ancient frugality was so severe, that they allowed no gold
to attend the corpse, but only that which served to fasten their
teeth. Whether the Opaline stone in this were burnt upon the finger of
the dead, or cast into the fire by some affectionate friend, it will
consist with either custom. But other incinerable substances were found
so fresh, that they could feel no singe from fire. These, upon view,
were judged to be wood; but, sinking in water, and tried by the fire,
we found them to be bone or ivory. In their hardness and yellow colour
they most resembled box, which, in old expressions, found the epithet
of eternal, and perhaps in such conservatories might have passed
uncorrupted.

That bay leaves were found green in the tomb of S. Humbert, after an
hundred and fifty years, was looked upon as miraculous. Remarkable it
was unto old spectators, that the cypress of the temple of Diana lasted
so many hundred years. The wood of the ark, and olive-rod of Aaron,
were older at the captivity; but the cypress of the ark of Noah was
the greatest vegetable of antiquity, if Josephus were not deceived by
some fragments of it in his days: to omit the moor logs and fir trees
found underground in many parts of England; the undated ruins of winds,
floods, or earthquakes, and which in Flanders still show from what
quarter they fell, as generally lying in a north-east position.

But though we found not these pieces to be wood, according to first
apprehensions, yet we missed not altogether of some woody substance;
for the bones were not so clearly picked but some coals were found
amongst them; a way to make wood perpetual, and a fit associate for
metal, whereon was laid the foundation of the great Ephesian temple,
and which were made the lasting tests of old boundaries and landmarks.
Whilst we look on these, we admire not observations of coals found
fresh after four hundred years. In a long-deserted habitation even
egg-shells have been found fresh, not tending to corruption.

In the monument of King Childerick the iron relicks were found all
rusty and crumbling into pieces; but our little iron pins, which
fastened the ivory works, held well together, and lost not their
magnetical quality, though wanting a tenacious moisture for the firmer
union of parts; although it be hardly drawn into fusion, yet that metal
soon submitteth unto rust and dissolution. In the brazen pieces we
admired not the duration, but the freedom from rust, and ill savour,
upon the hardest attrition; but now exposed unto the piercing atoms
of air, in the space of a few months, they begin to spot and betray
their green entrails. We conceive not these urns to have descended
thus naked as they appear, or to have entered their graves without the
old habit of flowers. The urn of Philopœmen was so laden with flowers
and ribbons, that it afforded no sight of itself. The rigid Lycurgus
allowed olive and myrtle. The Athenians might fairly except against
the practice of Democritus, to be buried up in honey, as fearing to
embezzle a great commodity of their country, and the best of that kind
in Europe. But Plato seemed too frugally politick, who allowed no
larger monument than would contain four heroick verses, and designed
the most barren ground for sepulture: though we cannot commend the
goodness of that sepulchral ground which was set at no higher rate than
the mean salary of Judas. Though the earth had confounded the ashes
of these ossuaries, yet the bones were so smartly burnt, that some
thin plates of brass were found half melted among them. Whereby we
apprehend they were not of the meanest caresses, perfunctorily fired,
as sometimes in military, and commonly in pestilence, burnings; or
after the manner of abject corpses, huddled forth and carelessly burnt,
without the Esquiline Port at Rome; which was an affront continued upon
Tiberius, while they but half burnt his body, and in the amphitheatre,
according to the custom in notable malefactors; whereas Nero seemed
not so much to fear his death as that his head should be cut off and
his body not burnt entire.

Some, finding many fragments of skulls in these urns, suspected
a mixture of bones; in none we searched was there cause of such
conjecture, though sometimes they declined not that practice.—The
ashes of Domitian were mingled with those of Julia; of Achilles with
those of Patroclus. All urns contained not single ashes; without
confused burnings they affectionately compounded their bones;
passionately endeavouring to continue their living unions. And when
distance of death denied such conjunctions, unsatisfied affections
conceived some satisfaction to be neighbours in the grave, to lie urn
by urn, and touch but in their manes. And many were so curious to
continue their living relations, that they contrived large and family
urns, wherein the ashes of their nearest friends and kindred might
successively be received, at least some parcels thereof, while their
collateral memorials lay in minor vessels about them.

Antiquity held too light thoughts from objects of mortality, while
some drew provocatives of mirth from anatomies, and jugglers
showed tricks with skeletons. When fiddlers made not so pleasant mirth
as fencers, and men could sit with quiet stomachs, while hanging
was played before them. Old considerations made few mementos
by skulls and bones upon their monuments. In the Egyptian obelisks
and hieroglyphical figures it is not easy to meet with bones. The
sepulchral lamps speak nothing less than sepulture, and in their
literal draughts prove often obscene and antick pieces. Where we
find D. M. it is obvious to meet with sacrificing pateras
and vessels of libation upon old sepulchral monuments. In the Jewish
hypogæum and subterranean cell at Rome, was little observable beside
the variety of lamps and frequent draughts of Anthony and Jerome we
meet with thigh-bones and death’s-heads; but the cemeterial cells of
ancient Christians and martyrs were filled with draughts of Scripture
stories; not declining the flourishes of cypress, palms, and olive,
and the mystical figures of peacocks, doves, and cocks; but iterately
affecting the portraits of Enoch, Lazarus, Jonas, and the vision of
Ezekiel, as hopeful draughts, and hinting imagery of the resurrection,
which is the life of the grave, and sweetens our habitations in the
land of moles and pismires.

Diis manibus.

Gentle inscriptions precisely delivered the extent of men’s lives,
seldom the manner of their deaths, which history itself so often leaves
obscure in the records of memorable persons. There is scarce any
philosopher but dies twice or thrice in Laertius; nor almost any life
without two or three deaths in Plutarch; which makes the tragical ends
of noble persons more favourably resented by compassionate readers who
find some relief in the election of such differences.

The certainty of death is attended with uncertainties, in time, manner,
places. The variety of monuments hath often obscured true graves; and
cenotaphs confounded sepulchres. For beside their real tombs, many have
found honorary and empty sepulchres. The variety of Homer’s monuments
made him of various countries. Euripides had his tomb in Africa, but
his sepulture in Macedonia. And Severus found his real sepulchre in
Rome, but his empty grave in Gallia.

He that lay in a golden urn eminently above the earth, was not like
to find the quiet of his bones. Many of these urns were broke by a
vulgar discoverer in hope of enclosed treasure. The ashes of Marcellus
were lost above ground, upon the like account. Where profit hath
prompted, no age hath wanted such miners. For which the most barbarous
expilators found the most civil rhetorick. Gold once out of the earth
is no more due unto it; what was unreasonably committed to the ground,
is reasonably resumed from it; let monuments and rich fabricks, not
riches, adorn men’s ashes. The commerce of the living is not to be
transferred unto the dead; it is not injustice to take that which none
complains to lose, and no man is wronged where no man is possessor.

What virtue yet sleeps in this terra damnata and aged cinders, were
petty magic to experiment. These crumbling relicks and long fired
particles superannuate such expectations; bones, hairs, nails, and
teeth of the dead, were the treasures of old sorcerers. In vain we
revive such practices; present superstition too visibly perpetuates the
folly of our forefathers, wherein unto old observation this island was
so complete, that it might have instructed Persia.

Plato’s historian of the other world lies twelve days incorrupted,
while his soul was viewing the large stations of the dead. How to
keep the corpse seven days from corruption by anointing and washing,
without extenteration, were an hazardable piece of art, in our choicest
practice. How they made distinct separation of bones and ashes from
fiery admixture, hath found no historical solution; though they seemed
to make a distinct collection and overlooked not Pyrrhus his toe. Some
provision they might make by fictile vessels, coverings, tiles, or flat
stones, upon and about the body (and in the same field, not far from
these urns, many stones were found underground), as also by careful
separation of extraneous matter composing and raking up the burnt bones
with forks, observable in that notable lamp of Galvanus Martianus,
who had the sight of the vas ustrinum or vessel wherein they burnt
the dead, found in the Esquiline field at Rome, might have afforded
clearer solution. But their insatisfaction herein begat that remarkable
invention in the funeral pyres of some princes, by incombustible sheets
made with a texture of asbestos, incremable flax, or salamander’s wool,
which preserved their bones and ashes incommixed.

How the bulk of a man should sink into so few pounds of bones and
ashes, may seem strange unto any who considers not its constitution,
and how slender a mass will remain upon an open and urging fire of the
carnal composition. Even bones themselves, reduced into ashes, do abate
a notable proportion. And consisting much of a volatile salt, when that
is fired out, make a light kind of cinders. Although their bulk be
disproportionable to their weight, when the heavy principle of salt is
fired out, and the earth almost only remaineth; observable in sallow,
which makes more ashes than oak, and discovers the common fraud of
selling ashes by measure, and not by ponderation.

Some bones make best skeletons, some bodies quick and speediest ashes.
Who would expect a quick flame from hydropical Heraclitus? The poisoned
soldier when his belly brake, put out two pyres in Plutarch. But in the
plague of Athens, one private pyre served two or three intruders; and
the Saracens burnt in large heaps, by the king of Castile, showed how
little fuel sufficeth. Though the funeral pyre of Patroclus took up
an hundred foot, a piece of an old boat burnt Pompey; and if the
burthen of Isaac were sufficient for an holocaust, a man may carry his
own pyre.

From animals are drawn good burning lights, and good medicines against
burning. Though the seminal humour seems of a contrary nature to fire,
yet the body completed proves a combustible lump, wherein fire finds
flame even from bones, and some fuel almost from all parts; though the
metropolis of humidity seems least disposed unto it, which might
render the skulls of these urns less burned than other bones. But
all flies or sinks before fire almost in all bodies: when the common
ligament is dissolved, the attenuable parts ascend, the rest subside in
coal, calx, or ashes.

To burn the bones of the king of Edom for lime, seems no irrational
ferity; but to drink of the ashes of dead relations, a passionate
prodigality. He that hath the ashes of his friend, hath an everlasting
treasure; where fire taketh leave, corruption slowly enters. In
bones well burnt, fire makes a wall against itself; experimented in
Copels, and tests of metals, which consist of such ingredients.
What the sun compoundeth, fire analyzeth, not transmuteth. That
devouring agent leaves almost always a morsel for the earth, whereof
all things are but a colony; and which, if time permits, the mother
element will have in their primitive mass again.

He that looks for urns and old sepulchral relicks, must not seek them
in the ruins of temples, where no religion anciently placed them. These
were found in a field, according to ancient custom, in noble or private
burial; the old practice of the Canaanites, the family of Abraham, and
the burying-place of Joshua, in the borders of his possessions; and
also agreeable unto Roman practice to bury by highways, whereby their
monuments were under eye:—memorials of themselves, and mementoes of
mortality unto living passengers; whom the epitaphs of great ones were
fain to beg to stay and look upon them,—a language though sometimes
used, not so proper in church inscriptions. The sensible rhetorick
of the dead, to exemplarity of good life, first admitted to the bones
of pious men and martyrs within church walls, which in succeeding ages
crept into promiscuous practice: while Constantine was peculiarly
favoured to be admitted into the church porch, and the first thus
buried in England, was in the days of Cuthred.

Christians dispute how their bodies should lie in the grave. In urnal
interment they clearly escaped this controversy. Though we decline the
religious consideration, yet in cemeterial and narrower burying-places,
to avoid confusion and cross-position, a certain posture were to be
admitted: which even Pagan civility observed. The Persians lay north
and south; the Megarians and Phœnicians placed their heads to the east;
the Athenians, some think, towards the west, which Christians still
retain. And Beda will have it to be the posture of our Saviour. That
he was crucified with his face toward the west, we will not contend
with tradition and probable account; but we applaud not the hand of
the painter, in exalting his cross so high above those on either side:
since hereof we find no authentic account in history, and even the
crosses found by Helena, pretend no such distinction from longitude or
dimension.

To be knav’d out of our graves, to have our skulls made drinking-bowls,
and our bones turned into pipes, to delight and sport our enemies, are
tragical abominations escaped in burning burials.

Urnal interments and burnt relicks lie not in fear of worms, or to
be an heritage for serpents. In carnal sepulture, corruptions seem
peculiar unto parts; and some speak of snakes out of the spinal marrow.
But while we suppose common worms in graves, ’tis not easy to find
any there; few in churchyards above a foot deep, fewer or none in
churches though in fresh-decayed bodies. Teeth, bones, and hair, give
the most lasting defiance to corruption. In an hydropical body, ten
years buried in the churchyard, we met with a fat concretion, where
the nitre of the earth, and the salt and lixivious liquor of the body,
had coagulated large lumps of fat into the consistence of the hardest
Castile soap, whereof part remaineth with us. After a battle
with the Persians, the Roman corpses decayed in few days, while the
Persian bodies remained dry and uncorrupted. Bodies in the same ground
do not uniformly dissolve, nor bones equally moulder; whereof in the
opprobrious disease, we expect no long duration. The body of the
Marquis of Dorset seemed sound and handsomely cereclothed, that
after seventy-eight years was found uncorrupted. Common tombs preserve
not beyond powder: a firmer consistence and compage of parts might
be expected from arefaction, deep burial, or charcoal. The greatest
antiquities of mortal bodies may remain in putrefied bones, whereof,
though we take not in the pillar of Lot’s wife, or metamorphosis of
Ortelius, some may be older than pyramids, in the putrefied relicks
of the general inundation. When Alexander opened the tomb of Cyrus,
the remaining bones discovered his proportion, whereof urnal fragments
afford but a bad conjecture, and have this disadvantage of grave
interments, that they leave us ignorant of most personal discoveries.
For since bones afford not only rectitude and stability but figure
unto the body, it is no impossible physiognomy to conjecture at fleshy
appendencies, and after what shape the muscles and carnous parts might
hang in their full consistencies. A full-spread cariola shows a
well-shaped horse behind; handsome formed skulls give some analogy of
fleshy resemblance. A critical view of bones makes a good distinction
of sexes. Even colour is not beyond conjecture, since it is hard to be
deceived in the distinction of the Negroes’ skulls. Dante’s
characters are to be found in skulls as well as faces. Hercules is not
only known by his foot. Other parts make out their comproportions and
inferences upon whole or parts. And since the dimensions of the head
measure the whole body, and the figure thereof gives conjecture of the
principal faculties: physiognomy outlives ourselves, and ends not in
our graves.
Purgat. xxiii. 31.

Severe contemplators, observing these lasting relicks, may think them
good monuments of persons past, little advantage to future beings;
and, considering that power which subdueth all things unto itself,
that can resume the scattered atoms, or identify out of anything,
conceive it superfluous to expect a resurrection out of relicks: but
the soul subsisting, other matter, clothed with due accidents, may
salve the individuality. Yet the saints, we observe, arose from graves
and monuments about the holy city. Some think the ancient patriarchs
so earnestly desired to lay their bones in Canaan, as hoping to make a
part of that resurrection; and, though thirty miles from Mount Calvary,
at least to lie in that region which should produce the first-fruits
of the dead. And if, according to learned conjecture, the bodies of
men shall rise where their greatest relicks remain, many are not like
to err in the topography of their resurrection, though their bones
or bodies be after translated by angels into the field of Ezekiel’s
vision, or as some will order it, into the valley of judgment, or
Jehosaphat.

Chapter IV

CHRISTIANS have handsomely glossed the deformity of death by
careful consideration of the body, and civil rites which take off
brutal terminations: and though they conceived all reparable by a
resurrection, cast not off all care of interment. And since the ashes
of sacrifices burnt upon the altar of God were carefully carried out
by the priests, and deposed in a clean field; since they acknowledged
their bodies to be the lodging of Christ, and temples of the Holy
Ghost, they devolved not all upon the sufficiency of soul-existence;
and therefore with long services and full solemnities, concluded their
last exequies, wherein to all distinctions the Greek devotion seems
most pathetically ceremonious.

Christian invention hath chiefly driven at rites, which speak hopes of
another life, and hints of a resurrection. And if the ancient Gentiles
held not the immortality of their better part, and some subsistence
after death, in several rites, customs, actions, and expressions, they
contradicted their own opinions: wherein Democritus went high, even to
the thought of a resurrection, as scoffingly recorded by Pliny.
What can be more express than the expression of Phocylides? Or who
would expect from Lucretius a sentence of Ecclesiastes? Before
Plato could speak, the soul had wings in Homer, which fell not, but
flew out of the body into the mansions of the dead; who also observed
that handsome distinction of Demas and Soma, for the body conjoined
to the soul, and body separated from it. Lucian spoke much truth
in jest, when he said that part of Hercules which proceeded from
Alcmena perished, that from Jupiter remained immortal. Thus Socrates
was content that his friends should bury his body, so they would not
think they buried Socrates; and, regarding only his immortal part, was
indifferent to be burnt or buried. From such considerations, Diogenes
might contemn sepulture, and, being satisfied that the soul could not
perish, grow careless of corporal interment. The Stoicks, who thought
the souls of wise men had their habitation about the moon, might make
slight account of subterraneous deposition; whereas the Pythagoreans
and transcorporating philosophers, who were to be often buried, held
great care of their interment. And the Platonicks rejected not a
due care of the grave, though they put their ashes to unreasonable
expectations, in their tedious term of return and long set revolution.
“Καὶ τάχα δ᾽ἐκ γαίης ἐλπίζομεν ἐς φάος ἐλθεῖν λεῖψαν ἀποιχομένων.”
thrice uttered by the attendants, was
also very solemn, and somewhat answered by Christians, who thought
it too little, if they threw not the earth thrice upon the interred
body. That, in strewing their tombs, the Romans affected the rose; the
Greeks amaranthus and myrtle: that the funeral pyre consisted of sweet
fuel, cypress, fir, larix, yew, and trees perpetually verdant, lay
silent expressions of their surviving hopes. Wherein Christians, who
deck their coffins with bays, have found a more elegant emblem; for
that it, seeming dead, will restore itself from the root, and its dry
and exsuccous leaves resume their verdure again; which, if we mistake
not, we have also observed in furze. Whether the planting of yew in
churchyards hold not its original from ancient funeral rites, or as
an emblem of resurrection, from its perpetual verdure, may also admit
conjecture.

They made use of musick to excite or quiet the affections of their
friends, according to different harmonies. But the secret and
symbolical hint was the harmonical nature of the soul; which, delivered
from the body, went again to enjoy the primitive harmony of heaven,
from whence it first descended; which, according to its progress traced
by antiquity, came down by Cancer, and ascended by Capricornus.

They burnt not children before their teeth appeared, as apprehending
their bodies too tender a morsel for fire, and that their gristly bones
would scarce leave separable relicks after the pyral combustion. That
they kindled not fire in their houses for some days after was a strict
memorial of the late afflicting fire. And mourning without hope, they
had an happy fraud against excessive lamentation, by a common opinion
that deep sorrows disturb their ghosts.

That they buried their dead on their backs, or in a supine position,
seems agreeable unto profound sleep, and common posture of dying;
contrary to the most natural way of birth; nor unlike our pendulous
posture, in the doubtful state of the womb. Diogenes was singular, who
preferred a prone situation in the grave; and some Christians like
neither, who decline the figure of rest, and make choice of an erect
posture.

That they carried them out of the world with their feet forward,
not inconsonant unto reason, as contrary unto the native posture of
man, and his production first into it; and also agreeable unto their
opinions, while they bid adieu unto the world, not to look again upon
it; whereas Mahometans who think to return to a delightful life again,
are carried forth with their heads forward, and looking toward their
houses.

They closed their eyes, as parts which first die, or first discover the
sad effects of death. But their iterated clamations to excitate their
dying or dead friends, or revoke them unto life again, was a vanity of
affection; as not presumably ignorant of the critical tests of death,
by apposition of feathers, glasses, and reflection of figures, which
dead eyes represent not: which, however not strictly verifiable in
fresh and warm cadavers, could hardly elude the test, in corpses of
four or five days.

That they sucked in the last breath of their expiring friends, was
surely a practice of no medical institution, but a loose opinion that
the soul passed out that way, and a fondness of affection, from some
Pythagorical foundation, that the spirit of one body passed into
another, which they wished might be their own.

That they poured oil upon the pyre, was a tolerable practice, while
the intention rested in facilitating the ascension. But to place good
omens in the quick and speedy burning, to sacrifice unto the winds for
a despatch in this office, was a low form of superstition.

The archimime, or jester, attending the funeral train, and imitating
the speeches, gesture, and manners of the deceased, was too light for
such solemnities, contradicting their funeral orations and doleful
rites of the grave.

That they buried a piece of money with them as a fee of the Elysian
ferryman, was a practice full of folly. But the ancient custom of
placing coins in considerable urns, and the present practice of
burying medals in the noble foundations of Europe, are laudable ways
of historical discoveries, in actions, persons, chronologies; and
posterity will applaud them.

We examine not the old laws of sepulture, exempting certain persons
from burial or burning. But hereby we apprehend that these were not
the bones of persons planet-struck or burnt with fire from heaven; no
relicks of traitors to their country, self-killers, or sacrilegious
malefactors; persons in old apprehension unworthy of the earth;
condemned unto the Tartarus of hell, and bottomless pit of Pluto, from
whence there was no redemption.

Nor were only many customs questionable in order to their obsequies,
but also sundry practices, fictions, and conceptions, discordant or
obscure, of their state and future beings. Whether unto eight or ten
bodies of men to add one of a woman, as being more inflammable and
unctuously constituted for the better pyral combustion, were any
rational practice; or whether the complaint of Periander’s wife be
tolerable, that wanting her funeral burning, she suffered intolerable
cold in hell, according to the constitution of the infernal house of
Pluto, wherein cold makes a great part of their tortures; it cannot
pass without some question.

Why the female ghosts appear unto Ulysses, before the heroes and
masculine spirits,—why the Psyche or soul of Tiresias is of the
masculine gender, who, being blind on earth, sees more than all the
rest in hell; why the funeral suppers consisted of eggs, beans,
smallage, and lettuce, since the dead are made to eat asphodels about
the Elysian meadows:—why, since there is no sacrifice acceptable, nor
any propitiation for the covenant of the grave, men set up the deity of
Morta, and fruitlessly adored divinities without ears, it cannot escape
some doubt.

The dead seem all alive in the human Hades of Homer, yet cannot well
speak, prophecy, or know the living, except they drink blood, wherein
is the life of man. And therefore the souls of Penelope’s paramours,
conducted by Mercury, chirped like bats, and those which followed
Hercules, made a noise but like a flock of birds.

The departed spirits know things past and to come; yet are ignorant of
things present. Agamemnon foretells what should happen unto Ulysses;
yet ignorantly inquires what is become of his own son. The ghosts are
afraid of swords in Homer; yet Sibylla tells Æneas in Virgil, the thin
habit of spirits was beyond the force of weapons. The spirits put off
their malice with their bodies, and Cæsar and Pompey accord in Latin
hell; yet Ajax, in Homer, endures not a conference with Ulysses; and
Deiphobus appears all mangled in Virgil’s ghosts, yet we meet with
perfect shadows among the wounded ghosts of Homer.

Since Charon in Lucian applauds his condition among the dead, whether
it be handsomely said of Achilles, that living contemner of death, that
he had rather be a ploughman’s servant, than emperor of the dead? How
Hercules his soul is in hell, and yet in heaven; and Julius his soul in
a star, yet seen by Æneas in hell?—except the ghosts were but images
and shadows of the soul, received in higher mansions, according to the
ancient division of body, soul, and image, or simulachrum of them
both. The particulars of future beings must needs be dark unto ancient
theories, which Christian philosophy yet determines but in a cloud of
opinions. A dialogue between two infants in the womb concerning the
state of this world, might handsomely illustrate our ignorance of the
next, whereof methinks we yet discourse in Pluto’s den, and are but
embryo philosophers.

Pythagoras escapes in the fabulous hell of Dante, among that swarm
of philosophers, wherein, whilst we meet with Plato and Socrates, Cato
is to be found in no lower place than purgatory. Among all the set,
Epicurus is most considerable, whom men make honest without an Elysium,
who contemned life without encouragement of immortality, and making
nothing after death, yet made nothing of the king of terrors.

Were the happiness of the next world as closely apprehended as the
felicities of this, it were a martyrdom to live; and unto such as
consider none hereafter, it must be more than death to die, which makes
us amazed at those audacities that durst be nothing and return into
their chaos again. Certainly such spirits as could contemn death, when
they expected no better being after, would have scorned to live, had
they known any. And therefore we applaud not the judgment of Machiavel,
that Christianity makes men cowards, or that with the confidence of
but half-dying, the despised virtues of patience and humility have
abased the spirits of men, which Pagan principles exalted; but rather
regulated the wildness of audacities in the attempts, grounds, and
eternal sequels of death; wherein men of the boldest spirits are often
prodigiously temerarious. Nor can we extenuate the valour of ancient
martyrs, who contemned death in the uncomfortable scene of their lives,
and in their decrepit martyrdoms did probably lose not many months of
their days, or parted with life when it was scarce worth the living.
For (beside that long time past holds no consideration unto a slender
time to come) they had no small disadvantage from the constitution
of old age, which naturally makes men fearful, and complexionally
superannuated from the bold and courageous thoughts of youth and
fervent years. But the contempt of death from corporal animosity,
promoteth not our felicity. They may sit in the orchestra, and noblest
seats of heaven, who have held up shaking hands in the fire, and
humanly contended for glory.

Meanwhile Epicurus lies deep in Dante’s hell, wherein we meet with
tombs enclosing souls which denied their immortalities. But whether
the virtuous heathen, who lived better than he spake, or erring in the
principles of himself, yet lived above philosophers of more specious
maxims, lie so deep as he is placed, at least so low as not to rise
against Christians, who believing or knowing that truth, have lastingly
denied it in their practice and conversation—were a query too sad to
insist on.

But all or most apprehensions rested in opinions of some future
being, which, ignorantly or coldly believed, begat those perverted
conceptions, ceremonies, sayings, which Christians pity or laugh at.
Happy are they which live not in that disadvantage of time, when men
could say little for futurity, but from reason: whereby the noblest
minds fell often upon doubtful deaths, and melancholy dissolutions.
With these hopes, Socrates warmed his doubtful spirits against that
cold potion; and Cato, before he durst give the fatal stroke, spent
part of the night in reading the Immortality of Plato, thereby
confirming his wavering hand unto the animosity of that attempt.

It is the heaviest stone that melancholy can throw at a man, to tell
him he is at the end of his nature; or that there is no further state
to come, unto which this seems progressional, and otherwise made
in vain. Without this accomplishment, the natural expectation and
desire of such a state, were but a fallacy in nature; unsatisfied
considerators would quarrel the justice of their constitutions, and
rest content that Adam had fallen lower; whereby, by knowing no other
original, and deeper ignorance of themselves, they might have enjoyed
the happiness of inferior creatures, who in tranquillity possess their
constitutions, as having not the apprehension to deplore their own
natures, and, being framed below the circumference of these hopes,
or cognition of better being, the wisdom of God hath necessitated
their contentment: but the superior ingredient and obscured part
of ourselves, whereto all present felicities afford no resting
contentment, will be able at last to tell us, we are more than our
present selves, and evacuate such hopes in the fruition of their own
accomplishments.

Chapter V

Now since these dead bones have already outlasted the living ones of
Methuselah, and in a yard underground, and thin walls of clay, outworn
all the strong and specious buildings above it; and quietly rested
under the drums and tramplings of three conquests: what prince can
promise such diuturnity unto his relicks, or might not gladly say,

_Sic ego componi versus in ossa velim?_

Time, which antiquates antiquities, and hath an art to make dust of all
things, hath yet spared these minor monuments.

In vain we hope to be known by open and visible conservatories, when
to be unknown was the means of their continuation, and obscurity their
protection. If they died by violent hands, and were thrust into their
urns, these bones become considerable, and some old philosophers would
honour them, whose souls they conceived most pure, which were thus
snatched from their bodies, and to retain a stronger propension unto
them; whereas they weariedly left a languishing corpse and with faint
desires of re-union. If they fell by long and aged decay, yet wrapt
up in the bundle of time, they fall into indistinction, and make but
one blot with infants. If we begin to die when we live, and long life
be but a prolongation of death, our life is a sad composition; we
live with death, and die not in a moment. How many pulses made up the
life of Methuselah, were work for Archimedes: common counters sum up
the life of Moses his man. Our days become considerable, like petty
sums, by minute accumulations: where numerous fractions make up but
small round numbers; and our days of a span long, make not one little
finger.
and time hath
no wings unto it. But the most tedious being is that which can unwish
itself, content to be nothing, or never to have been, which was beyond
the malcontent of Job, who cursed not the day of his life, but his
nativity; content to have so far been, as to have a title to future
being, although he had lived here but in an hidden state of life, and
as it were an abortion.

What song the Syrens sang, or what name Achilles assumed when he hid
himself among women, though puzzling questions, are not beyond
all conjecture. What time the persons of these ossuaries entered the
famous nations of the dead, and slept with princes and counsellors,
might admit a wide solution. But who were the proprietaries of
these bones, or what bodies these ashes made up, were a question
above antiquarism; not to be resolved by man, nor easily perhaps by
spirits, except we consult the provincial guardians, or tutelary
observators. Had they made as good provision for their names, as they
have done for their relicks, they had not so grossly erred in the
art of perpetuation. But to subsist in bones, and be but pyramidally
extant, is a fallacy in duration. Vain ashes which in the oblivion
of names, persons, times, and sexes, have found unto themselves a
fruitless continuation, and only arise unto late posterity, as emblems
of mortal vanities, antidotes against pride, vain-glory, and madding
vices. Pagan vain-glories which thought the world might last for ever,
had encouragement for ambition; and, finding no atropos unto the
immortality of their names, were never dampt with the necessity of
oblivion. Even old ambitions had the advantage of ours, in the attempts
of their vain-glories, who acting early, and before the probable
meridian of time, have by this time found great accomplishment of
their designs, whereby the ancient heroes have already outlasted their
monuments and mechanical preservations. But in this latter scene of
time, we cannot expect such mummies unto our memories, when ambition
may fear the prophecy of Elias, and Charles the Fifth can never
hope to live within two Methuselahs of Hector.
That the world may last but six thousand years.
must conclude and shut up all. There is no
antidote against the opium of time, which temporally considereth all
things: our fathers find their graves in our short memories, and sadly
tell us how we may be buried in our survivors. Gravestones tell truth
scarce forty years. Generations pass while some trees stand, and old
families last not three oaks. To be read by bare inscriptions like
many in Gruter, to hope for eternity by enigmatical epithets or first
letters of our names, to be studied by antiquaries, who we were, and
have new names given us like many of the mummies, are cold consolations
unto the students of perpetuity, even by everlasting languages.

To be content that times to come should only know there was such a
man, not caring whether they knew more of him, was a frigid ambition
in Cardan; disparaging his horoscopal inclination and judgment
of himself. Who cares to subsist like Hippocrates’s patients, or
Achilles’s horses in Homer, under naked nominations, without deserts
and noble acts, which are the balsam of our memories, the entelechia
and soul of our subsistences? To be nameless in worthy deeds, exceeds
an infamous history. The Canaanitish woman lives more happily without a
name, than Herodias with one. And who had not rather have been the good
thief, than Pilate?

But the iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy, and deals
with the memory of men without distinction to merit of perpetuity.
Who can but pity the founder of the pyramids? Herostratus lives that
burnt the temple of Diana, he is almost lost that built it. Time hath
spared the epitaph of Adrian’s horse, confounded that of himself. In
vain we compute our felicities by the advantage of our good names,
since bad have equal durations, and Thersites is like to live as long
as Agamemnon without the favour of the everlasting register. Who
knows whether the best of men be known, or whether there be not more
remarkable persons forgot, than any that stand remembered in the known
account of time? The first man had been as unknown as the last, and
Methuselah’s long life had been his only chronicle.

Oblivion is not to be hired. The greater part must be content to be as
though they had not been, to be found in the register of God, not in
the record of man. Twenty-seven names make up the first story and the
recorded names ever since contain not one living century. The number
of the dead long exceedeth all that shall live. The night of time far
surpasseth the day, and who knows when was the equinox? Every hour
adds unto that current arithmetick, which scarce stands one moment.
And since death must be the Lucina of life, and even Pagans
could doubt, whether thus to live were to die; since our longest sun
sets at right descensions, and makes but winter arches, and therefore
it cannot be long before we lie down in darkness, and have our light
in ashes; since the brother of death daily haunts us with dying
mementoes, and time that grows old in itself, bids us hope no long
duration;—diuturnity is a dream and folly of expectation.

Darkness and light divide the course of time, and oblivion shares
with memory a great part even of our living beings; we slightly
remember our felicities, and the smartest strokes of affliction leave
but short smart upon us. Sense endureth no extremities, and sorrows
destroy us or themselves. To weep into stones are fables. Afflictions
induce callosities; miseries are slippery, or fall like snow upon
us, which notwithstanding is no unhappy stupidity. To be ignorant of
evils to come, and forgetful of evils past, is a merciful provision
in nature, whereby we digest the mixture of our few and evil days,
and, our delivered senses not relapsing into cutting remembrances, our
sorrows are not kept raw by the edge of repetitions. A great part of
antiquity contented their hopes of subsistency with a transmigration
of their souls,—a good way to continue their memories, while having
the advantage of plural successions, they could not but act something
remarkable in such variety of beings, and enjoying the fame of their
passed selves, make accumulation of glory unto their last durations.
Others, rather than be lost in the uncomfortable night of nothing,
were content to recede into the common being, and make one particle of
the public soul of all things, which was no more than to return into
their unknown and divine original again. Egyptian ingenuity was more
unsatisfied, contriving their bodies in sweet consistences, to attend
the return of their souls. But all is vanity, feeding the wind, and
folly. Egyptian mummies, which Cambyses or time hath spared, avarice
now consumeth. Mummy is become merchandise, Mizraim, cures wounds, and
Pharaoh is sold for balsams.

In vain do individuals hope for immortality, or any patent from
oblivion, in preservations below the moon; men have been deceived even
in their flatteries, above the sun, and studied conceits to perpetuate
their names in heaven. The various cosmography of that part hath
already varied the names of contrived constellations; Nimrod is lost
in Orion, and Osyris in the Dog-star. While we look for incorruption
in the heavens, we find that they are but like the earth;—durable in
their main bodies, alterable in their parts; whereof, beside comets and
new stars, perspectives begin to tell tales, and the spots that wander
about the sun, with Phaeton’s favour, would make clear conviction.

There is nothing strictly immortal, but immortality. Whatever hath no
beginning, may be confident of no end;—all others have a dependent
being and within the reach of destruction;—which is the peculiar of
that necessary essence that cannot destroy itself;—and the highest
strain of omnipotency, to be so powerfully constituted as not to
suffer even from the power of itself. But the sufficiency of Christian
immortality frustrates all earthly glory, and the quality of either
state after death, makes a folly of posthumous memory. God who can
only destroy our souls, and hath assured our resurrection, either
of our bodies or names hath directly promised no duration. Wherein
there is so much of chance, that the boldest expectants have found
unhappy frustration; and to hold long subsistence, seems but a scape
in oblivion. But man is a noble animal, splendid in ashes, and pompous
in the grave, solemnizing nativities and deaths with equal lustre, nor
omitting ceremonies of bravery in the infamy of his nature.

Life is a pure flame, and we live by an invisible sun within us. A
small fire sufficeth for life, great flames seemed too little after
death, while men vainly affected precious pyres, and to burn like
Sardanapalus; but the wisdom of funeral laws found the folly of
prodigal blazes and reduced undoing fires unto the rule of sober
obsequies, wherein few could be so mean as not to provide wood, pitch,
a mourner, and an urn.

Five languages secured not the epitaph of Gordianus. The man of
God lives longer without a tomb than any by one, invisibly interred
by angels, and adjudged to obscurity, though not without some marks
directing human discovery. Enoch and Elias, without either tomb or
burial, in an anomalous state of being, are the great examples of
perpetuity, in their long and living memory, in strict account being
still on this side death, and having a late part yet to act upon this
stage of earth. If in the decretory term of the world we shall not all
die but be changed, according to received translation, the last day
will make but few graves; at least quick resurrections will anticipate
lasting sepultures. Some graves will be opened before they be quite
closed, and Lazarus be no wonder. When many that feared to die, shall
groan that they can die but once, the dismal state is the second and
living death, when life puts despair on the damned; when men shall wish
the coverings of mountains, not of monuments, and annihilations shall
be courted.

While some have studied monuments, others have studiously declined
them, and some have been so vainly boisterous, that they durst not
acknowledge their graves; wherein Alaricus seems most subtle, who
had a river turned to hide his bones at the bottom. Even Sylla, that
thought himself safe in his urn, could not prevent revenging tongues,
and stones thrown at his monument. Happy are they whom privacy makes
innocent, who deal so with men in this world, that they are not afraid
to meet them in the next; who, when they die, make no commotion among
the dead, and are not touched with that poetical taunt of Isaiah.

Pyramids, arches, obelisks, were but the irregularities of vain-glory,
and wild enormities of ancient magnanimity. But the most magnanimous
resolution rests in the Christian religion, which trampleth upon pride
and sits on the neck of ambition, humbly pursuing that infallible
perpetuity, unto which all others must diminish their diameters, and be
poorly seen in angles of contingency.

Pious spirits who passed their days in raptures of futurity, made
little more of this world, than the world that was before it, while
they lay obscure in the chaos of pre-ordination, and night of their
fore-beings. And if any have been so happy as truly to understand
Christian annihilation, ecstasies, exolution, liquefaction,
transformation, the kiss of the spouse, gustation of God, and
ingression into the divine shadow, they have already had an handsome
anticipation of heaven; the glory of the world is surely over, and the
earth in ashes unto them.

To subsist in lasting monuments, to live in their productions, to exist
in their names and predicament of chimeras, was large satisfaction unto
old expectations, and made one part of their Elysiums. But all this is
nothing in the metaphysicks of true belief. To live indeed, is to be
again ourselves, which being not only an hope, but an evidence in noble
believers, ’tis all one to lie in St Innocent’s church-yard as in
the sands of Egypt. Ready to be anything, in the ecstasy of being ever,
and as content with six foot as the moles of Adrianus.

Tabésne cadavera solvat,
An rogus, haud refert.
—Lucan, VIII. 809

Colophon

Sir Thomas Browne (1605–1682). Hydriotaphia, Urn-Burial; or, a Discourse of the Sepulchral Urns Lately Found in Norfolk. First published London, 1658. This text from the folio edition of 1686, reproduced in the edition by J. W. Willis Bund (Sampson Low, Son, and Marston, London, 1869).

The discovery of some forty to fifty burial urns near Old Walsingham in Norfolk in 1658 prompted Browne to write this discourse, which ascends from archaeological description through comparative funerary practices to a final chapter that many have called the finest sustained prose passage in English: "Man is a noble animal, splendid in ashes, and pompous in the grave."

This is an archival text. Browne's seventeenth-century English is preserved. See also: Religio Medici (1643) · A Letter to a Friend (c. 1656, published 1690) — Browne's companion works in the archive.

Sourced from Project Gutenberg eBook #586. Digitized by Henry Flower and Judith Boss, Omaha, Nebraska. Compiled and formatted for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.

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