Newton County GaArchives Obituaries.....Middlebrooks, Robert Hollis August 14 1899
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Phyllis Thompson http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00011.html#0002524 December 4, 2004, 3:30 pm

The Georgia Enterprise, August 18, 1899
In Loving Memory
     ROBERT HOLLIS MIDDLEBROOKS, born October 8th, 1898, died August 14th, 1899.
     Among the mysteries of earth, which God has reserved for himself to make 
plain- and He will do it some day, some happy day! - there is none which more 
excites our wondering sorrow and infinitely tender compassion that the death of 
a little child.
     Not compassion for the child  - no! Who can believe but that there opens 
up before the dying baby a life of such beauty and brightness and completeness, 
that the human mind cannot compass it, not human language touch its remotest 
bound! Our compassion is for the bruised hearts and empty arms that are left 
behind; and our wondering sorrow is that earth is not yet pure enough to keep 
longer these transitory angel visitants. Still, the hearts.
     “Just to have held it ‘til it died, Will be the better.”
     Those who believe that such human life has its mission will find nothing 
to disprove it merely in short duration. Who can calculate the sweetness and 
fragrance, the joy and gladness, the richness and fullness, that have been 
added to the sum of human life, in the life of baby Hollis? His parents 
darling, he led them into green pastures of a rich experience hitherto and 
undreamed of and by the waters of such joy as only happy parenthood can know.
     He is not lost to them - just gone before. Through all the coming years, 
the precious memory of his short, sweet stay with them will be a hallowing 
influence.
     “Lifting them up from the common sod, To a purer air and a broader view.” 
And can it ever fail of comfort to know that, no matter what stress of storm 
and strife may come to press upon  poor earth-dwellers, this lovely baby is 
forever safe, forever sinless, and forever blest?
There is joy in the gardens of Heaven, to day;
A lovely new floweret is there;
And the angels who bore it from earth, far away,
Still guard it with tenderest care.
They behold with delight the forget-me-not blue
Of the wide open radiant eyes;

For in all that fair realm is no lovelier hue;
And there, beauty fades not, nor dies.
For God is the sun of that beauteous land;
His love is its shadow and shine;
No blossom can droop near His sheltering hand.
But shall grow in the likeness divine.

Is it fancy that paints the bright visions of spheres.
Where we see our lost loved ones in bliss?
Is it fancy that sings to our listening ears
Of life sweeter and fuller than this?

Hope sprangles the dim mystic future with stars;
Faith clothes them with substance and grace;
Love human, be deluged with sorrows and tears,
Yield but to love Perfect her place.
What though, if on earth, there are desolate hearts,
In the home where this baby bud grew.
And all the day long, do they miss the sweet arts
The bright smiles ever winsome and new?

Is it naught, stricken ones, that though far from your sight;
He blossoms in beauty divine?
God’s welcoming smile in his light and his life;
God’s welcoming arms are his shrine.

Oh! fair is the vision - if vision it be -
To earth’s sorrowing ones that is given;
“In heaven their angels my Father’s face see”
“For of Such is the kingdom of Heaven.”
A. D. F. H.
Hayston, August 15th, 1899


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