Psalms 103:16

For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more.

The autumn wind: an emblem of death

I. The autumn wind works gradually. Blade by blade, the herbs wither under its influence; and leaf by leaf, the tree is stripped of its foliage. Thus on gradually until all is dust. So death works gradually. “We die daily.”

II. The autumn wind works universally. It is on all herbage, in all forests, it withers all, sows death everywhere. All are dying, individuals, families, nations, the whole generation.

III. The autumn wind works insidiously. Only occasionally does it come with the rush of violence, and scatter the leaves. Quietly, invisibly, insidiously it works. So does death. It is working in their systems when men are utterly unconscious of it. “The wind passeth over it and it is gone.” And when the wind of death passeth over us, we are gone, gone for ever. (Homilist.)

Soon forgotten

We shall sleep none the less sweetly, though none be talking about us over our heads. The world has a short memory, and, as the years go on the list that it has to remember grows so crowded that it is harder and harder to find room to write a new name on it, or to read the old. The letters on the tombstones are soon erased by the feet that tramp across the churchyard. (A. Maclaren, D.D.)