It is now time to allude to our own burial customs, and to the great reform which happily has at length begun. It appears extraordinary, that amidst the advance which has been made in social and sanitary science, Great Britain should be the last to give up the unwholesome custom of continuing the dead as near neighbours to the quick. The long conservation of this evil has mainly arisen from a sentiment of the superior sanctity of burial-places in and near to sacred edifices. That this is, however, an unqualified superstition, it is not difficult to prove, by tracing it to its root. Joseph Bingham states in his _Origines Ecclesiasticæ_, that churchyards owe their origin to respect paid to the remains of saints and martyrs, which was shown first by building churches and chapels over them, and then by a general desire of people to be interred as near to their sacred dust as possible. This privilege was only for a time accorded to Emperors and Kings, but so early as the sixth century the commonalty were allowed places, not only under the church wall, but in the consecrated space of ground surrounding it. Bodies were not deposited within the church till after a long struggle on the part of the heads of the Church.[F] So far from burying in churches, corpses were not admitted into parish churches, even for the funeral service to be read over them, except under special circumstances. An interesting canon—the 15th of the Council of Tribur—runs thus, ‘The funeral service must only be performed in the church where the bishop resides: that is to say in the cathedral of the diocese. If that church be too distant, it may be celebrated in some other, where there is a community of canons, monks, or religious orders; in order that the deceased may have the benefit of their prayers. Should again that be impossible, the service may be performed where the defunct during life paid tythes: this is in his parish church.’ By a previous canon (one of the Council of Meaux) no burial fees could be exacted by the clergy, although the relations were allowed to give alms to the poor. This injunction was but little observed either at or after the time it was laid, in 845. [F] Several canons were issued against this now universal abuse. Among others, the 18th of the Council of Brague (Portugal) in 563. The 72nd of the Council of Meaux (845), the 17th of the Council of Tribur, 895, &c.