Palmers all our Fathers were
    I a Palmer lived here
    And travelled still till worn with age
    I ended this world’s pilgrimage,
    On the blest Ascension-day
    In the chearful month of May;
    One thousand with four hundred seven,
    And took my journey hence to heaven.

With this join the following, which was formerly to be seen upon a fair marble under the portraiture of one of the abbots of St. Albans.

    Hic quidem terra tegitur
    Peccati solvens debitum
    Cujus nomen non impositum
    In libro vitae sit inscriptum.

The spirit of it may be thus given:  ’Here lies, covered by the earth, and paying his debt to sin, one whose name is not set forth:  may it be inscribed in the Book of Life!’

But these instances, of the humility, the pious faith and simplicity of our forefathers, have led me from the scene of our contemplations—­a Country Church-yard! and from the memorials at this day commonly found in it.  I began with noticing such as might be wholly uninteresting from the uniformity of the language which they exhibit; because, without previously participating the truths upon which these general attestations are founded, it is impossible to arrive at that state of disposition of mind necessary to make those epitaphs thoroughly felt which have an especial recommendation.  With the same view, I will venture to say a few words upon another characteristic of these compositions almost equally striking; namely, the homeliness of some of the inscriptions, the strangeness of the illustrative images, the grotesque spelling, with the equivocal meaning often struck out by it, and the quaint jingle of the rhymes.  These have often excited regret in serious minds, and provoked the unwilling to good-humoured laughter.  Yet, for my own part, without affecting any superior sanctity, I must say that I have been better satisfied with myself, when in these evidences I have seen a proof how deeply the piety of the rude forefathers of the hamlet, is seated in their natures; I mean how habitual and constitutional it is, and how awful the feeling which they attach to the situation of their departed friends,—­a proof of this rather than of their ignorance or of a deadness in their faculties to a sense of the ridiculous.  And that this deduction may be just, is rendered probable by the frequent occurrence of passages according to our present notion, full as ludicrous, in the writings of the most wise and learned men of former ages, divines and poets, who in the earnestness of their souls have applied metaphors and illustrations, taken either from Holy Writ or from the usages of their own country, in entire confidence that the sacredness of the theme they were discussing would sanctify the meanest object connected with it; or rather without ever conceiving it was possible that a ludicrous thought could spring up in any mind engaged in such meditations.  And certainly, these odd and fantastic combinations are not confined to epitaphs of the peasantry, or of the lower orders of society, but are perhaps still more commonly produced among the higher, in a degree equally or more striking.  For instance, what shall we say to this upon Sir George Vane, the noted Secretary of State to King Charles I.?