Death is nothing at all

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Death is nothing at all

I have only slipped away into the next room

I am I and you are you

Whatever we were to each other

That we are still

Call me by my old familiar name

Speak to me in the easy way you always used

Put no difference into your tone

Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow

Laugh as we always laughed

At the little jokes we always enjoyed together

Play, smile, think of me, pray for me

Let my name be ever the household word that it always was

Let it be spoken without effort

Without the ghost of a shadow in it

Life means all that it ever meant

It is the same as it ever was

There is absolute unbroken continuity

What is death but a negligible accident?

Why should I be out of mind

Because I am out of sight?

I am waiting for you for an interval

Somewhere very near

Just around the corner

All is well.

Nothing is past; nothing is lost

One brief moment and all will be as it was before

How we shall laugh at the trouble of parting when we meet again!

 

Canon Henry Scott-Holland (1847-1918)

 Canon of St Paul’s Cathedral

‘The King of Terrors’, a sermon on death delivered in St Paul’s Cathedral on Whitsunday 1910, while the body of King Edward VII was lying in state at Westminster. It was published in Facts of the Faith in 1919.

 

A shortened version:

Death is nothing at all.

I have only slipped away into the next room.

I am I and you are you.

Whatever we were to each other, that we are still ……

Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight?

I am waiting for you for an interval.

Somewhere very near, just around the corner.

All is well.

 

Or a shortened version in French:

Vous voyez tout est bien 
  La mort n’est rien, je suis simplement pass’ dans la pi’ce ‘ c’t’. 
 Je suis moi, vous ‘tes vous, 
Ce que nous ‘tions les uns pour les autres, nous le sommes toujours. 
Donnez-moi le nom que vous m’avez toujours donn’, 
Parlez-moi comme vous l’avez toujours fait, 
N’employez pas un ton solennel ou triste, 
Continuez ‘ rire de ce qui nous faisait rire ensemble, 
Priez, souriez, pensez ‘ moi, 
Que mon nom soit prononc’ comme il l’a toujours ‘t’, 
Sans emphase d’aucune sorte, sans trace d’ombre, 
La vie signifie tout ce qu’elle a toujours signifi’, 
Elle est ce qu’elle a toujours ‘t’. Le fil n’est pas 
coup’, simplement parce que je suis hors de votre vue. 
Je vous attends. Je ne suis pas loin, 
Juste de l’autre c’t’ du chemin. 
Vous voyez – tout est bien.

 

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