A god cannot procure death for himself, even if he wished it, which, so numerous are the evils of life, has been granted to man as our chief good.

The play is the tragedy “Man,” And its hero the conqueror worm.

In dealing with the dead, if we treat them as if they were entirely dead, that would show a want of affection and should not be done; or, if we treat them as if they were entirely alive, that would show a want of wisdom and should not be done.

There never is absolute birth nor complete death, in the strict sense, consisting in the separation of the soul from the body. What we call births are developments and growths, while what we call deaths are envelopments and diminutions.

Death and vulgarity are the only two facts in the nineteenth century that one cannot explain away.

A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest.

Imagine a number of men in chains, all under sentence of death, some of whom are each day butchered in the sight of the others; those remaining see their own condition in that of their fellows and, looking at each other with grief and despair, await their turn. This is an image of the human condition.

I was born without knowing why, I have lived without knowing why, and I am dying without either knowing why or how.

Man has here two and a half minutes—one to smile, one to sigh, and half a one to love; for in the midst of this minute he dies.

There is no man so fortunate that there shall not be by him when he is dying some who are pleased with what is going to happen.

It is not my design to drink or sleep; my design is to make what haste I can to be gone.

The dead are often just as living to us as the living are, only we cannot get them to believe it. They can come to us, but till we die we cannot go to them. To be dead is to be unable to understand that one is alive. 

It is noble to die before doing anything that deserves death.