PARK AND CEMETERY. 
i37 
had that finest of garden attributes — seclusion, for 
without thickets of shrubbery Adam and Eve would 
have made no futile efforts to hide from the wrath 
of their maker. The beauty of its trees was so 
great that they are frequently referred to; admira- 
ble qualities of most highly esteemed men are com- 
pared to them as, for instance, in speaking of the 
Assyrian King as a Cedar of Lebanon it is said, 
“I have made him fair so that all the trees that were 
in the garden of God envied him.” 
That the garden as a whole was a model is shown 
by side lights rather than by direct testimony. 
In Isaiah 51:3, we find, “For the Lord shall 
comfort Zion; He will comfort all her waste places; 
and He will make her wilderness like Eden, and 
her desert like the garden of the Lord,” and Ezk. 
36:35, “and they shall say: this land that was des- 
olate is become like the garden of Eden.” 
This place of delight must have been made up 
of open, grassy glades fringed with blooming flow- 
ers, belted with shrubbery and grouped with splen- 
did trees; along the flowing streams aquatics flour- 
ished, in quiet pools the water lily floated, in sha- 
ded glens lush ferns abounded and lovely vines 
wove flower-decked draperies. It was a place where 
the beautiful and harmless creatures dressed in 
feathers and fur, that what the Lord had made could 
live out their free, unhampered lives, just as the 
same wild birds and small animals should now be 
free to live in the groves and trees around us, to 
help make our surroundings, in some measure, 
comparable to the fair garden of the Lord that flour- 
ished for a time in the dewy morning of the world. 
* * * 
But interest centres in the three important gar- 
dens specifically mentioned in the Scriptures. 
The first, green and flourishing, fresh from the 
hands of the maker of all good things, the “Gar- 
den of God,” has already been noticed. 
* * * 
In the New Testament we read that “over the 
brook Cedron there was a garden.” 
A layman may speak of the material side of 
Gethsemane without sacrilege, and it is of special 
interest in connection with this subject because of 
its secluded situation on the Mount of Olives, sep- 
arated from the city by a valley and a brook.” 
The chief end of a Park or a garden is to se- 
cure restful quiet for man — a place where human 
beings may resort for meditation, and under the 
soothing influence of kindly nature straighten the 
tangled web of life and return refreshed to its 
routine. 
That the Son of God sought consolation for hu- 
man suffering in such a retreat should have influ- 
ence with the sons of men. 
The last of the trio of Bible gardens is also men- 
tionedjn the New Testament, where it is recorded, 
“Now in the place where he was crucified there was 
a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, 
wherein was never man yet laid.” 
I believe that authorities agree in locating this 
tomb in a"situation where, at that time, trees grew, 
and it naturally follows that it contained other veg- 
etation, so it was not a misnomeUto’call the place 
a garden. It is significant that the [body of Christ 
was not consigned to a public burial place, but to 
the “tomb of a rich man.” 
This is of peculiar interest to the people of our 
day, for it proves conclusively that even then all 
who could afford the luxury of burial in a garden 
preferred it to interment in a stone yard. Indeed, 
it may well be assumed that this fact is the germ of 
the modern cemetery movement This modern 
idea is already in practice in the largest, wealthiest, 
and only artistic cemeteries of the United States, 
and is to the end of securing burial for all — rich and 
poor alike, — in beautiful parks that are to be relig- 
iously cared for as such as long as the present civil- 
ization endures. That is, in cemeteries where the 
best obtainable talent has so grouped the trees and 
shrubs that a park-like effect is gained; where con- 
spicuous monuments are very few and most care- 
fully located; where head stones are substantial, but 
low and inconspicuous, so that they do not mar the 
landscape and give the idea of a stone yard; where 
foot stones, copings, curbings, railings, hedges, and 
lot boundaries of every kind are excluded; where 
the grade of the entire enclosure is permanently 
fixed, and where all graves are level with the sur- 
face, so that nothing interferes with the continuity 
of the ground, nor the easy care of the entire broad 
expanse of turf; where, in short, the trees, shrubs, 
green sward and monuments together form a peace- 
ful picture of repose. 
* # * 
The conclusions drawn from the Bible lessons 
under consideration are: that it was the divine in- 
tention that good people should live in gardens, 
and that banishment from such delights was the 
first punishment inflicted on the human race; that 
gardens were intended for the physical, mental and 
spiritual regeneration of men, and that it is mete 
for human dust to rest in gardens. For all this 
there is ample precedent and example. And to 
add the last touch of grace to these Bible object- 
lessons, and give the idea wings to carry it above 
earthly dust and ashes, it may be said a garden is 
still the synonym of Paradise. Fanny Copley Seavey. 
Note. — This paper also included the Hanging Gardens of 
Babylon- but as these ancient gardens have been often referred 
to and described, this part is omitted. Mrs. Seavey calls her 
paper an example of amateur Home Missionary work. — E d. 
