Death Quotes - Page 29

• If you don't know how to die, don't worry; Nature will tell you what to do on the spot, fully and adequately. She will do this job perfectly for you; don't bother your head about it.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Funny, Jobs, Worry

  Essays Bk III, Ch. 12 'Of Physiognomy'

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• The realm of death seems an enemy's country to most men, on whose shores they are loathly driven by stress of weather; to the wise man it is the desired port where he moors his bark gladly, as in some quiet haven of the Fortunate Isles; it is the golden west into which his sun sinks, and, sinking, casts back a glory upon the leaden cloud-tack which had darkly besieged his day.

  James Russell Lowell

  Wise, Country, Stress

  James Russell Lowell (1845). “Conversations on Some of the Old Poets”, p.111

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• We look at death through the cheap-glazed windows of the flesh, and believe him the monster which the flawed and cracked glass represents him.

  James Russell Lowell

  Believe, Glasses, Monsters

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• At the last, when we die, we have the dear angels for our escort on the way. They who can grasp the whole world in their hands can surely also guard our souls, that they make that last journey safely.

  Martin Luther

  Angel, Journey, Hands

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• O Earth, so full of dreary noises!
  O men, with wailing in your voices!
  O delved gold, the wader's heap!
  O strife, O curse, that o'er it fall!
  God makes a silence through you all,
  And "giveth His beloved, sleep.

  Elizabeth Barrett Browning

  Fall, Sleep, Men

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• When the dust of death has choked a great man's voice, the common words he said turn oracles, the common thoughts he yoked like horses draw like griffins.

  Elizabeth Barrett Browning

  Horse, Men, Dust

  Elizabeth Barrett Browning (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (Illustrated)”, p.867, Delphi Classics

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• It seems as though, at the approach of a certain dark hour, the light of heaven infills those who are leaving the light of earth.

  Victor Hugo

  Dark, Light, Heaven

  Victor Hugo (1994). “Les Miserables Volume One”, p.170, Wordsworth Editions

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• The fear of approaching death, which in youth we imagine must cause inquietude to the aged, is very seldom the source of much uneasiness.

  William Hazlitt

  Causes, Youth, Imagine

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• There are remedies for all things but death.

  Thomas Carlyle

  Remedy, All Things

  Thomas Carlyle (1858). “The French Revolution: A History”, p.81

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• To have to die is a distinction of which no man is proud.

  Alexander Smith

  Men, Proud, Distinction

  Dreamthorp Ch. II (1863)

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• No king nor nation one moment can retard the appointed hour.

  John Dryden

  Kings, Moments, Hours

  John Dryden, “Palamon And Arcite; Or The Knight's Tale. From Chaucer. In Three Books. Book Ii.”

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• Love masters agony; the soul that seemed
  Forsaken feels her present God again
  And in her Father's arms
  Contented dies away.

  John Keble

  Father, Agony, Soul

  John Keble (1874). “The Christian Year: Thoughts in Verse for the Sundays and Holydays Throughout the Year”, p.82

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• It is very singular how the fact of a man's death often seems to give people a truer idea of his character, whether for good or evil, than they have ever possessed while he was living and acting among them.

  Nathaniel Hawthorne

  Appreciation, Character, Men

  Nathaniel Hawthorne (2015). “Complete Novels of Nathaniel Hawthorne (Illustrated Edition): Fanshawe, The Scarlet Letter with its Adaptation, The House of the Seven Gables, The Blithedale Romance, The Marble Faun, The Dolliver Romance, Septimius Felton, Grimshawe's Secret and Biography”, p.546, e-artnow

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• Death is so genuine a fact that it excludes falsehoods, or betrays its emptiness; it is a touchstone that proves the gold, and dishonors the baser metal.

  Nathaniel Hawthorne

  Gold, Facts, Emptiness

  Nathaniel Hawthorne (2001). “The House of the Seven Gables”, p.367, Applewood Books

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• If human love hath power to penetrate the veil--and hath it not?--then there are yet living here a few who have the blessedness of knowing that an angel loves them.

  Nathaniel Hawthorne

  Angel, Knowing, Veils

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• Among the poor, the approach of dissolution is usually regarded with a quiet and natural composure, which it is consolatory to contemplate, and which is as far removed from the dead palsy of unbelief as it is from the delirious raptures of fanaticism. Theirs is a true, unhesitating faith, and they are willing to lay down the burden of e weary life, in the sure and certain hope of a blessed immortality.

  Robert Southey

  Blessed, Quiet, Immortality

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• The happiest of pillows is not that which love first presses! it is that which death has frowned on and passed over.

  Walter Savage Landor

  Firsts, Pillow, Presses

  Walter Savage Landor (1898). “Selections from the Writings of Walter Savage Landor”

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• The birds of the air die to sustain thee; the beasts of the field die to nourish thee; the fishes of the sea die to feed thee. Our stomachs are their common sepulchre. Good God! with how many deaths are our poor lives patched up! how full of death is the life of momentary man!

  Francis Quarles

  Men, Air, Sea

  Francis Quarles (1844). “Enchiridion Institutions, Essays and Maxims, political, moral & divine. Divided into four centuries. By Francis Quarles”, p.53

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• Our respect for the dead, when they are just dead, is something wonderful, and the way we show it more wonderful still. We show it with black feathers and black horses; we show it with black dresses and black heraldries; we show it with costly obelisks and sculptures of sorrow, which spoil half of our beautiful cathedrals. We show it with frightful gratings and vaults, and lids of dismal stone, in the midst of the quiet grass; and last, and not least, we show it by permitting ourselves to tell any number of falsehoods we think amiable or credible in the epitaph.

  John Ruskin

  Beautiful, Horse, Thinking

  John Ruskin (1902*). “Works”

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• Whatever stress some may lay upon it, a death-bed repentance is but a weak and slender plank to trust our all on.

  Laurence Sterne

  Stress, Bed, May

  Laurence Sterne (1859). “The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy: Gentleman & A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy”, p.540

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• It is not length of life, but depth of life.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Inspirational, Life, Birthday

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2010). “Collected Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Volume VIII: Letters and Social Aims”, p.191, Harvard University Press

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• Sunset and evening star, And one clear call for me! And may there be no moaning of the bar When I put out to sea.

  Alfred Lord Tennyson

  Stars, Sunset, Sea

  'Crossing the Bar' (1889)

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• Death knocks at your door, and before you can tell him to come in, he is in the house with you.

  Grace Ogot

  Doors, House

  Grace Ogot (1988). “Land Without Thunder”, p.45, East African Publishers

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• The report of my death was an exaggeration.

  Mark Twain

  Funny, Exaggeration Is, Obituary

  Quoted in N.Y. Journal, 2 June 1897. These words were preceded by "James Ross Clemens, of St. Louis, a cousin of mine, was seriously ill two or three weeks ago in London, but is well now. The report of my illness grew out of his illness." The quotation is usually reported as "Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated." Much earlier (5 July 1863), the following appeared in a letter by Twain to the Territorial Enterprise: "There was a report about town, last night, that Charles Strong, Esq

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• We run after values that, at death, become zero. At the end of your life, nobody asks you how many degrees you have, or how many mansions you built, or how many Rolls Royces you could afford. That's what dying patients teach you.

  Copyright: Elisabeth Kubler-Ross Family Limited Partnership.

  Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

  Running, Zero, Dying

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