Motivational Quotes

Death

Every man is born as many men and dies as a single one.

- Heidegger, Martin

Best Quotes about Death

A few can touch the magic string, and noisy fame is proud to win them: Alas for those that never sing, but die with all their music in them!

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

Our dead brothers still live for us and bid us think of life, not death -- of life to which in their youth they lent the passion and glory of Spring. As I listen, the great chorus of life and joy begins again, and amid the awful orchestra of seen and unseen powers and destinies of good and evil, our trumpets, sound once more a note of daring, hope, and will.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

Since the death instinct exists in the heart of everything that lives, since we suffer from trying to repress it, since everything that lives longs for rest, let us unfasten the ties that bind us to life, let us cultivate our death wish, let us develop it, water it like a plant, let it grow unhindered. Suffering and fear are born from the repression of the death wish.

Ionesco, Eugene

Unquiet souls. In the dark fermentation of earth, in the never idle workshop of nature, in the eternal movement, yea shall find yourselves again.

Arnold, Matthew

We are all dead men on leave.

Levine, Eugene

A dying man needs to die, as a sleepy man needs to sleep, and there comes a time when it is wrong, as well as useless, to resist.

Alsop, Steward

Some dying men are the most tyrannical; and certainly, since they will shortly trouble us so little for evermore, the poor fellows ought to be indulged.

Melville, Herman

As the waters fail from the sea, and the flood decayeth and drieth up: so man lieth down, and riseth not: till the heavens be no more, they shall not awake, nor be raised out of their sleep. [Job 14:11-12]

Bible

The infant runs toward it with its eyes closed, the adult is stationary, the old man approaches it with his back turned.

Diderot, Denis

10.

The dead should be judged like criminals, impartially, but they should be allowed the benefit of the doubt.

Butler, Samuel

11.

Think not disdainfully of death, but look on it with favor; for even death is one of the things that Nature wills.

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus

12.

The Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea are made of the same water. It flows down, clean and cool, from the heights of Herman and the roots of the cedars of Lebanon. the Sea of Galilee makes beauty of it, the Sea of Galilee has an outlet. It gets to give. It gathers in its riches that it may pour them out again to fertilize the Jordan plain. But the Dead Sea with the same water makes horror. For the Dead Sea has no outlet. It gets to keep.

Fosdick, Harry Emerson

13.

Death is as sure for that which is born, as birth is for that which is dead. Therefore grieve not for what is inevitable.

Bhagavad Gita

14.

Death can sneak up on you like a silent kitten, surprising you with it's touch and you have a right to act surprised. Other times death stomps in the front door, unwanted and unannounced, and makes it's noisy way to your seat on the sofa.

Hugh Elliott

15.

My idea of walking into the jaws of death is marrying some woman who has lost three husbands.

Hubbard, Kin

16.

It is difficult to accept death in this society because it is unfamiliar. In spite of the fact that it happens all the time, we never see it.

KuBler-Ross, Elisabeth

17.

If you don't think your life is worth more than someone else's, sign your donor card and kill yourself now.

Matthew V. Lewis

18.

dying is an art, like everything else. I do it exceptionally well. I do it so it feels like hell. I do it so it feels real. I guess you could say I've a call.

Plath, Sylvia

19.

To stop sinning suddenly.

Hubbard, Elbert

20.

I would not that death should take me asleep. I would not have him merely seize me, and only declare me to be dead, but win me, and overcome me. When I must shipwreck, I would do it in a sea, where mine impotency might have some excuse; not in a sullen weedy lake, where I could not have so much as exercise for my swimming.

Donne, John

21.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep.

Frost, Robert

22.

When I die I want to decompose in a barrel of porter and have it served in all the pubs in Dublin.

Donleavy, J. P.

23.

I guess that's how death works. It doesn't matter if we're ready or not. It just happens.

Randy K. Milholland

24.

No one's death comes to pass without making some impression, and those close to the deceased inherit part of the liberated soul and become richer in their humanness.

Broch, Hermann

25.

Fear of death has been the greatest ally of tyranny past and present.

Hook, Sydney

26.

The art of living well and the art of dying well are one.

Epicurus

27.

Death is like an arrow that is already in flight, and your life lasts only until it reaches you.

Hermes, Georg

28.

I am not dying, not anymore than any of us are at any moment. We run, hopefully as fast as we can, and then everyone must stop. We can only choose how we handle the race.

Hugh Elliott

29.

I don't want to achieve immortality through my work... I want to achieve it through not dying.

Woody Allen

30.

The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. [1 Corinthians 15:26]

Bible

31.

But life is sweet, though all that makes it sweet. Lessen like sound of friends departing feet; And death is beautiful as feet of friend. Coming with welcome at our journey's end.

Lowell, James Russell

32.

To die is landing on some distant shore.

Dryden, John

33.

We are not victims of aging, sickness and death. These are part of scenery, not the seer, who is immune to any form of change. This seer is the spirit, the expression of eternal being.

Chopra, Deepak

34.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life.

Steve Jobs

35.

As we look deeply within, we understand our perfect balance. There is no fear of the cycle of birth, life and death. For when you stand in the present moment, you are timeless.

Rodney Yee

36.

Never knock on Death's door: ring the bell and run away! Death really hates that!

Matt Frewer

37.

Woe, woe, woe... in a little while we shall all be dead. Therefore let us behave as though we were dead already.

Chandler, Raymond

38.

When one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language.

Donne, John

39.

Your body must become familiar with its death -- in all its possible forms and degrees -- as a self-evident, imminent, and emotionally neutral step on the way towards the goal you have found worthy of your life.

Hammarskjold, Dag

40.

For the sword outwears its sheath, and the soul wears out the breast. And the heart must pause to breathe, and love itself have rest.

Byron, Lord

41.

The words of a dead man are modified in the guts of the living.

Auden, W. H.

42.

I look upon death to be as necessary to our constitution as sleep. We shall rise refreshed in the morning.

Franklin, Benjamin

43.

Death eats up all things, both the young lamb and old sheep; and I have heard our parson say, death values a prince no more than a clown; all's fish that comes to his net; he throws at all, and sweeps stakes; he's no mower that takes a nap at noon-day, but drives on, fair weather or foul, and cuts down the green grass as well as the ripe corn: he's neither squeamish nor queesy-stomach d, for he swallows without chewing, and crams down all things into his ungracious maw; and you can see no belly he has, he has a confounded dropsy, and thirsts after men's lives, which he gurgles down like mother's milk.

Cervantes, Miguel De

44.

Death is a Dialogue between, the Spirit and the Dust.

Dickinson, Emily

45.

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.

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

46.

Dying is a very dull, dreary affair. My advice to you is to have nothing whatever to do with it.

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

47.

Life, in my estimation, is a biological misadventure that we terminate on the shoulders of six strange men whose only objective is to make a hole in one with you.

Allen, Fred A.

48.

How gladly would I meet mortality, my sentence, and be earth in sensible! how glad would lay me down, as in my mother's lap! There I should rest, and sleep secure.

Milton, John

49.

Pale death with an impartial foot knocks at the hovels of the poor and the palaces of king.

Horace

50.

Be open to your dreams, people. Embrace that distant shore. Because our mortal journey is over all too soon.

David Assael