BISHOPS AND CREMATION.

Waikato Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2247, 2 December 1886, Page 3

BISHOPS AND CREMATION.

The Bishop of London recently, in speaking at the Church of England Funeral and Mourning Reform Association, gave the cremationists a lift by the way, and in aIJ probability intended to do so. There were certain objections, he said, to that practice, arising partly out of prejudice and partly out of the possibility of its destroying the evidences of crime. But, in dealing with this aspect of the question, he gave conclusive proof that he not only understood chemistry but theology much better than the Bishop of Peterboiough. That eloquent prelate years ago spoke as though the incineration of human remains would 'destroy the body, and thus render the resurrection impossible, He was probably not aware that the materials of the body are often taken up by plants, and thus pass in the shape of food into other human bodies and possibly many times ver. T' t> BiV: .p if L -id -m kno.\s flu>st> Licts well, i \x\r\ u it I , out directly robukinpr hi«. right lev. bi other, openly confuted both his theology and his science. He was anxious, he said for his hearers to get rid of the heathenish idea that it was desirable to keep the body as long as possible apart from the earth, when the true object of burial was to restore the corruptible elements as quickly as possible to their native earth. He seemed to think that those methods of burial which most quickly perform tins necessary and ultimately inevitable process are most to be preferred. The cremationists claim it has the chief merit of their system that it does this in the course of a few hours, whilist the quickest modes of burial in practice require years to accomplish it. They will certainly claim the Bishop of London as one of their most ardent champion*. Prom the tone of his speech we imagine that he will not be seriously disquieted by their inference.