Raymond; or, Life and Death: With examples of the evidence for survival of memory and affection after death.Lodge, Oliver, Sir
Religion
Raymond; or, Life and Death: With examples of the evidence for survival of memory and affection after death.
Lodge, Oliver, Sir
Future life; Lodge, Raymond, 1889-1915 (Spirit); Spiritualism; World War, 1914-1918 -- Personal narratives, British
That death is the end has never been a Christian doctrine, and
evidence collected by careful men in our own day has, perhaps
needlessly, upheld with weak props of experiment the mighty arch of
Faith. Death is real and grievous, and is not to be tempered by the
glossing timidities of those who would substitute journalese like
"passing-on," "passing-over," etc., for that tremendous word: but it
is the end of a stage, not the end of the journey. The road stretches
on beyond that inn, and beyond our imagination, "the moonlit endless
way."
Let us think of him then, not as lying near Ypres with all his work
ended, but rather, after due rest and refreshment, continuing his
noble and useful career in more peaceful surroundings, and quietly
calling us his family from paralysing grief to resolute and high
endeavour.
Indeed, it is not right that we should weep for a death like his.
Rather let us pay him our homage in praise and imitation, by growing
like him and by holding our lives lightly in our Country's service,
so that if need be we may die like him. This is true honour and his
best memorial.
Not that I would undervalue those of brass or stone, for if beautiful
they are good and worthy things. But fame illuminates memorials, and
fame has but a narrow circle in a life of twenty-six years.
Who shall remember him, who climb
His all-unripened fame to wake,
Who dies an age before his time?
But nobly, but for England's sake.
Who will believe us when we cry
He was as great as he was brave?
His name that years had lifted high
Lies buried in that Belgian grave.
O strong and patient, kind and true,
Valiant of heart, and clear of brain--
They cannot know the man we knew,
Our words go down the wind like rain.
O. W. F. L.
_Tintern_
EPITAPH ON MEMORIAL TABLET IN ST. GEORGE'S CHURCH, EDGBASTON
REMEMBER
RAYMOND LODGE
SECOND LIEUTENANT SECOND SOUTH LANCASHIRE REGIMENT
BELOVED SON OF SIR OLIVER AND LADY LODGE OF THIS PARISH
WHO GAVE HIS LIFE FOR HIS COUNTRY
HE WAS BORN JANUARY 25TH 1889
AND WAS KILLED IN ACTION IN FLANDERS
ABOUT NOON SEPTEMBER 14TH
IN THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1915
AGED 26 YEARS
Whoso bears the whole heaviness of the wronged world's weight
And puts it by,
It is well with him suffering, though he face man's fate;
How should he die?
_Swinburne_
REMINISCENCES BY O. J. L.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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