130 Quotes About Death

Let your hope of heaven master your fear of death.

The body of Benjamin Franklin, Printer, lies here, food for worms; but the work shall not be lost, for it will appear once more in a new and more elegant edition, revised and corrected by the Author.

Until we are willing to die, we have no right to live.

When it comes to life and death, there's no third option.

Death did not first strike Adam, the first sinful man, nor Cain, the first hypocrite, but Abel, the innocent and righteous. The first soul that met death overcame death; the first soul parted from earth went to heaven. Death argues not displeasure, because he whom God loved best dies first, and the murderer is punished with living.

A good character is the best tombstone. Those who loved you and were helped by you will remember you when forget-me-nots have withered. Carve your name on hearts, not on marble.

Feasts and business and pleasure and enjoyments seem great things to us, whilst we think of nothing else; but as soon as we add death to them they all sink into an equal littleness.

Six feet by two-and-a-half is all the ground that the richest man in England will shortly occupy.

Many good purposes and intentions lie in the churchyard.

A wretched, poor and helpless worm, on Thy kind arms I fall.

100 per cent of us die, and the percentage cannot be increased.

I am not tired of my work, neither am I tired of the world; yet, when Christ calls me home, I shall go with gladness.

There is nothing more tragic than to come to the end of life and know we have been on the wrong course.

He whose head is in heaven need not fear to put his feet into the grave.

You have come into a hard world. I know of only one easy place in it, and that is the grave.

Death is not more certainly a separation of our souls from our bodies than the Christian life is a separation of our souls from worldly tempers, vain indulgences, and unnecessary cares.

There is an essential difference between the decease of the godly and the death of the ungodly. Death comes to the ungodly man as a penal infliction, but to the righteous as a summons to his Father's palace. To the sinner it is an execution, to the saint an undressing from his sins and infirmities. Death to the wicked is the King of terrors. Death to the saint is the end of terrors, the commencement of glory.

You will tell the others that I am going home a little sooner than I thought. Then tell them not to talk about the servant but to talk about the Savior.

For thirty years his life was spent in an unwearied effort to evangelize.

It is better for me to die in behalf of Jesus Christ, than to reign over all the ends of the earth.

No eulogy is due to him who simply does his duty and nothing more.

Live in Christ, live in Christ, and the flesh need not fear death.

"Perfect correspondence," according to Mr. Herbert Spencer, would be "perfect Life." To abolish Death, therefore, all that would be necessary would be to abolish Imperfection. But it is the claim of Christianity that it can abolish Death. And it is significant to notice that it does so by meeting this very demand of Science--it abolishes Imperfection.

When it comes time to die, make sure that all you have to do is die.

God buries His workmen but carries on His work.

The hope of dying is the only thing that keeps me alive.

I account this body nothing but a close prison to my soul; and the earth a larger prison to my body. I may not break prison, till I be loosed by death; but I will leave it, not unwillingly, when I am loosed.

The bitterest tears shed over graves are for words left unsaid and deeds left undone.

Our piety must be weak and imperfect if it do not conquer the fear of death.

Death is the last and best physician, which cures all diseases and sins - the aching head and the unbelieving heart. Sin was the midwife which brought death into the world; and death shall be the grave to bury sin! O the privilege of a believer!

I have sent for you that you may see how a Christian can die.

Alas! that the farthest and of all our thoughts should be the thought of our ends.

Death comes equally to us all, and makes us all equal when it comes.

The people of God may have to taste a little of the waters of death's dark river, but Christ went to the very bottom of it, and rose again, and is alive for evermore.

Only He who really lived a human life (and I presume that only one did) can fully taste the horror of death.

Whomsoever the last day of his own life finds unprepared, this last day will find unprepared also.

For we brought nothing into the world and we cannot take anything out of the world (1 Tim. 6:7). There are no U-Hauls behind hearses.

If you have one grain of grace, you must die to know how rich you are.

Death is only a grim porter to let us into a stately palace.

We spend our years with sighing; it is a valley of tears; but death is the funeral of all our sorrows.

We do not picture the possessor of this carnal mind as in any sense a monster. We have said he may be high-toned, virtuous, and pure. The plant is not a monster because it is dead to the voice of the bird; nor is he a monster who is dead to the voice of God. The contention at present simply is that he is DEAD.

Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry.

Deathbed repentance is burning the candle of life in the service of the devil, and then blowing the smoke into the face of God.

Nothing, not even what is lowest and most bestial, will not be raised again if it submits to death.

You have been used to take notice of the sayings of dying men. This is mine: that a life spent in the service of God, and communion with Him, is the most comfortable and pleasant life that anyone can live in this world.

If life has not made you by God's grace, through faith, holy--think you, will death without faith do it? The cold waters of that narrow stream are no purifying bath in which you may wash and be clean. No! No! As you go down into them, you will come up from them.

It is when a man has no one to love him that he commits suicide. So long as he has friends, those who love him and whom he loves, he will live, because to live is to love. Be it but the love of a dog, it will keep him in life; but let that go and he has no contact with life, no reason to live. He dies by his own hand.

Has this world been so kind to you that you should leave with regret? There are better things ahead than any we leave behind.

I find that many Christians are in trouble about the future; they think they will not have grace enough to die by. It is much more important that we should have grace enough to live by. It seems to me that death is of very little importance in the meantime. When the dying hour comes, there will be dying grace; but you do not require dying grace to live by.

When you leave this world, will you be known as one who accumulated treasures on earth that you couldn't keep? Or will you be recognized as one who invested treasures in heaven that you couldn't lose?

Are you ready to shake hands with death?

The world dares say no more for its device, than "while I live, I hope"; but the children of God can add by virtue of a living hope, "while I expire, I hope."

The churchyard is the market place where all things are rated at their true value, and those who are approaching it talk of the world and its vanities with a wisdom unknown before.

My dear Jesus, my Savior, is so deeply written in my heart, that I feel confident, that if my heart were to be cut open and chopped to pieces, the name of Jesus would be found written on every piece.

God has reserved to Himself the right to determine the end of life, because He alone knows the goal to which it is His will to lead it. It is for Him alone to justify a life or to cast it away.

We do not know the value of Christ, if we will not cleave to Him unto death!

Those who give not till they die show that they would not then if they could keep it any longer.

Both in thy private sessions, and the universal assizes, thou shalt be sure of the same Judge, the same jury, the same witnesses, the same verdict. How certain thou art to die, thou knowest; how soon to die, thou knowest not. Measure not thy life with the longest; that were to piece it out with flattery. Thou canst name no living man, not the sickest, which thou art sure shall die before thee.

No man who is fit to live need fear to die. To us here, death is the most terrible thing we know. But when we have tasted its reality it will mean to us birth, deliverance, a new creation of ourselves. It will be what health is to the sick man; what home is to the exile; what the loved one given back is to the bereaved. As we draw near to it a solemn gladness should fill our hearts. It is God's great morning lighting up the sky. Our fears are the terror of children in the night. The night with its terrors, its darkness, its feverish dreams, is passing away; and when we awake it will be into the sunlight of God.

A good conscience will save no man, wash away no sin, not lift us one hair's breadth towards heaven. Yet a good conscience will be found a pleasant visitor at our bedside in a dying hour.

The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.

Of all escape mechanisms, death is the most efficient.

Death of the spirit is the cessation of its communication with God. Death of the body is the cutting off of communication between spirit and body.

Is it reasonable to take it ill, that anybody desires of us that which is their own? All we have is the Almighty's; and shall not God have his own when he calls for it?

I have seen many men and women of fashion die, and I never saw one of them die well. The trappings off, there they lay on the tumbled pillow, and there were just two things that bothered them, a wasted life and a coming eternity.

If you live wrong you can't die right.

The grave has a door on its inner side.

Live so that when the final summons comes you will leave something more behind you than an epitaph on a tombstone or an obituary in a newspaper.

Briars and thistles wither not so soon as lilies and roses. They may be taken out of the world, of whom the world is not worthy; and they remain behind, who are not worthy to live in the world.

How many who died last century are in hell--who never committed half the sins some of you have!

It unfortunately happens that no man believes that he is likely to die soon. So everyone is much disposed to defer the consideration of what ought to be done on the supposition of such an emergency; and while nothing is so uncertain as human life, so nothing is so certain as our assurance that we shall survive most of our neighbors.

Our body is a well-set clock, which keeps good time, but if it be too much or indiscreetly tampered with, the alarm runs out before the hour.

The grave has a door on its inner side.

Please my loving friends and family, don't cry for me, for all my life His was the only face I desperately longed to see.n

Tombs are the clothes of the dead; a grave is but a plain suit; a rich monument is an embroidered one.

You ask for a practical direction to teach you to die well. Detach your souls from everything that you love, separate from God. This, in a few words, is the science of dying.

To go back is nothing but death: to go forward is fear of death, and life everlasting beyond it. I will yet go forward."

Riches may leave us while we live, we must leave them when we die.

Earth recedes, heaven opens. I've been through the gates! Don't call me back ... if this is death, it's sweet. Dwight! Irene! I see the children's faces. [Dwight and Irene were his dead grandchildren.]

Tears are a tribute to our deceased friends. When the body is sown, it must be watered. But we must not sorrow as those that have no hope; for we have a good hope through grace both concerning them and concerning ourselves.

He's what we really need. If your friend is sick and dying, the most important thing he wants is not an explanation but for you to sit with him. He's terrified of being alone more than anything else. So God has not left us alone.