If a parricide is more wicked than anyone who commits homicide—because he kills not merely a man but a near relative—without doubt worse still is he who kills himself, because there is none nearer to a man than himself. 

What is death? A scary mask. Take it off—see, it doesn’t bite.

I looked and there was a pale green horse! Its rider’s name was Death, and Hades followed with him.

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.

Those from whom we were born have long since departed, and those with whom we grew up exist only in memory. We, too, through the approach of death, become, as it were, trees growing on the sandy bank of a river.

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

Death renders all equal.

I don’t believe in an afterlife, although I am bringing a change of underwear.

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

Every individual existence goes out in a lonely spasm of helpless agony.

You are dust, and to dust you shall return.