456 MASSACHUSETTS'HOETICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



by the founders of Mount Auburn that the public 

 health suffered for want of such a cemetery as was pro- 

 posed, and that both natural and Christian feelings were 

 wounded by the neglect of the dead and the generally 

 uncared for condition of burial places. Yet such was 

 the influence of custom, and so strong were the preju- 

 dices against the radical change involved in the estab- 

 lishment of rural cemeteries, that individual exertions 

 were inadequate to found them; and hence all the 

 influence of a new, popular, and energetic society, like 

 the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, was needed 

 to establish the first rural cemetery in the New World. 

 That influence was exerted, and Mount Auburn was 

 established, and is to-day not only the oldest rural ceme- 

 tery, but one of the most beautiful, in the United States, 

 the parent of Greenwood, Laurel Hill, and the hun- 

 dreds of similar cemeteries that have been consecrated 

 in all the cities and prominent towns in our country. 

 Nor has the influence of the Society ceased here ; but, 

 reaching beyond these cemeteries, it has led to the im- 

 provement and adornment of the once neglected village 

 and church burial places, and educated the whole people 

 to pay proper attention to the sepulture of the dead. 

 Who can estimate the blessed influences that have come 

 down to comfort thousands of sorrowing hearts as they 

 laid away their loved ones in the quiet shades of Mount 

 Auburn or other rural cemeteries, which would never 

 have existed but for this Society 1 It is not too much 

 to say, that, if this had been the only work accomplished 

 by it, it would fully have justified its existence. 



The most direct and positive good effected by the 

 Society has been the great improvements in gardens 

 and farms, and their productions, in Massachusetts and 



