Internment in the church is wisely prohibited; an indecency incompatible
with a civilized people. The foreigner will be apt to hold forth the
barbarity of the English nation, by observing, "They introduce
corruption in their very churches, and pay divine adoration upon the
graves of their ancestors."

Places of worship were designed for the living, the dead give up their
title with their life: besides, even small degrees of putrefaction,
confined in a room where the air cannot circulate, may become
prejudicial to health: it also ruins the pavement, as is done at St.
Martin's. Our first inhabitants, therefore, lie contented in the church
yard, by their unfortunate equals; having private sepulchres
appropriated for family use--Perhaps at the last day, no inquiry will be
made whether they lay on the in, or the outside of the walls.

It is difficult to traverse the elegant walks that surround this gulf of
death, without contemplating, that time is drawing us towards the same
focus, and that we shall shortly fall into the centre: that this
irregular circle contains what was once generous and beautiful, opulent
and humane. The arts took their rise in this fruitful soil: this is the
grave of invention and of industry; here those who figured upon the
stage are fallen, to make way for others, who must follow: though
multitudes unite with the dead, the numbers of the living increase; the
inhabitants change, while the genius improves. We cannot pass on without
reading upon the stones, the short existence of our departed friends,
perusing the end of a life with which we were well acquainted. The
active motion that veered with the rude blasts of seventy years, slops
in this point for ever.