20 ON SEPULCHRAL MONUMENTS. 
around us;—and by stripping the common in- 
terests of life of that inordinate importance 
which, in the absence of better thoughts and 
occupations, they invariably assume, confers 
upon us an obligation of surpassing weight. 
To look back from the gloom and the fever- 
ish activity of our native town, upon the ruins 
of Mycenee and the plain of Sardis, is assuredly 
a grateful task; and it can not be otherwise 
than beneficial to have our thoughts occasionally 
recalled from the weary and absorbing interests 
of the passing hour, to meditate on the dim and 
beautiful twilight of antiquity, and become 
chastened and elevated, though it be but for a 
moment, by the contemplation of those monu- 
ments of past time, which have survived the 
lightening and the hurricane,—the army and 
earthquake,—and the lapse of nearly thirty 
centuries. 
It is not uninteresting to observe how gene- 
rally the monuments, erected in honour of the 
dead, have outlived those reared for the use or 
the luxuries of the living. Thus, in the East, 
we constantly meet with extensive cemeteries, 
standing alone in a deserted region, where 
the cities which peopled them have been entire- 
