When Are You Going To Die?
Richard Carlson, Ph.D., was an author, psychotherapist, and motivational speaker, who became famous with the success of his book, Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff... and it’s all Small Stuff (1997). The book became one of the fastest-selling books of all time. It is divided into 100 brief chapters. The last chapter is entitled, “Live This Day as if It Were Your Last. It May Be.” Carlson lived his last day on December 13, 2006. He died of a pulmonary embolism during a flight from San Francisco to New York, leaving his wife and two teenage daughters.
Carlson said that he ended his book with this chapter as a reminder of how precious life and loved ones are. He wrote: “I often wonder, when listening to the news, did the person who died in the auto accident on his way home from work remember to tell his family how much he loved them?” Carlson started the 100th chapter asking, “When are you going to die? In fifty years, twenty, ten, five, today? Last time I checked, no one had told me.”
He died suddenly and unexpectedly nine years later at the age of 45.
"Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom" (Psalm 90:12).
Death and Dying Quotes (part 1)
“When it comes time to die, be very sure the only thing you have to do is die.” [Attributed to Jim Elliot (1927 – 1956) was an evangelical Christian who was one of five missionaries killed while participating in Operation Auca, an attempt to evangelize the Huaorani people of Ecuador.]
“When you were born, you cried and the world rejoiced. Live your life in such a manner that when you die the world cries and you rejoice.” [Indian Proverb]
“Men talk of killing time, while time quietly kills them.” [Dion Boucicault (ca. 1820 1890) was an Irish actor and playwright.]
“The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them.” [Jack London (1876 – 1916) was an American author, journalist, and social activist, best known for his works The Call of the Wild and White Fang.]
“Use your health, even to the point of wearing it out. That is what it is for. Spend all you have before you die; do not outlive yourself.” [George Bernard Shaw (1856 – 1950) was a Nobel-Prize-winning Irish playwright and critic, best known for his play Pygmalion, later adapted for Broadway and the theater as My Fair Lady.]
“Life is not lost by dying; life is lost minute by minute, day by dragging day, in all the thousand small uncaring ways.” [Stephen Vincent Benét (1898 – 1943) was an American author, poet, short story writer, and novelist, best known for his poem John Brown's Body and his short story, The Devil and Daniel Webster.]
“Why be saddled with this thing called life expectancy? Of what relevance to an individual is such a statistic? Am I to concern myself with an allotment of days I never had and was never promised? Must I check off each day of my life as if I am subtracting from this imaginary hoard? No, on the contrary, I will add each day of my life to my treasure of days lived. And with each day, my treasure will grow, not diminish.” [Robert Brault (1963 - ) is an American operatic tenor.]
“No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.” [Steve Jobs (1955 – 2011) was an American businessman, best known as the co-founder, former chairman, and former chief executive officer of Apple Inc.]
“Death, the last sleep? No, it is the final awakening.” [Sir Walter Scott (1771 – 1832) was a Scottish historical novelist, playwright and poet.]
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.” [Mark Twain (1835 – 1910) was an American author and humorist, best known for his novels The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.]
“When your time comes to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song, and die like a hero going home.” [Tecumseh (1768 – 1813) was a Native American leader of the Shawnee and a large tribal confederacy known as Tecumseh's Confederacy.]
"Someday you will read in the papers that D.L. Moody of Northfield is dead. Don't you believe a word of it. At that moment I shall be more alive than I am now. I shall have gone higher, that is all--out of this old clay tenement into a house that is immortal, a body that sin cannot touch, that sin cannot taint, a body fashioned like His glorious body. I was born in the flesh in 1837; I was born of the Spirit in 1856. That which is born of the flesh may die; that which is born of the Spirit will live forever." [D.L. Moody (1837 – 1899) was an American evangelist and publisher, who founded the Moody Church, the Moody Bible Institute, and Moody Publishers.]
“If a man has not discovered something that he will die for, he isn't fit to live.” [Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929 – 1968), was an American Baptist minister, activist, humanitarian, and leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement.]
"Science has found that nothing can disappear without a trace. Nature does not know extinction. All it knows is transformation. If God applies the fundamental principle to the most minute and insignificant parts of the universe, doesn't it make sense to assume that He applies it to the masterpiece of His creation--the human soul? I think it does." [Dr. Werner von Braun (1912 – 1977) was a German born aerospace engineer and space architect credited with inventing the V-2 Rocket and the Saturn V, for Nazi Germany and the United States, respectively. Having served in the Nazi Third Reich, he later was brought to the US to help pioneer the space program, and is said to have come to faith through the influence of Evangelical Christians].
“Millions long for immortality who don't know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon.” [Susan Ertz (1894 – 1985) was a British fiction writer and novelist, best known for sentimental tales.]
“I am not afraid of death, I just don't want to be there when it happens.” [Woody Allen (1935 - ) is an American actor, writer, director, comedian and playwright.]
“Death is no more than passing from one room into another. But there's a difference for me, you know. Because in that other room I shall be able to see.” [Helen Keller (1880 – 1968) was a deaf-blind American author, political activist, and lecturer, and was the subject of famous play/movie “The Miracle Worker.”]
“When we die we leave behind us all that we have and take with us all that we are.” [Author unknown.] “In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” [Benjamin Franklin (1705 – 1790) was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. He was a leading author, printer, political theorist, politician, freemason, postmaster, scientist, inventor, civic activist, statesman, and diplomat.]
“The stroke of death is as a lover's pinch, which hurts and is desired.” William Shakespeare (circa 1564 - 1616) was an English poet, playwright, and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist.]
“Personally, I would be delighted if there were a life after death, especially if it permitted me to continue to learn about this world and others, if it gave me a chance to discover how history turns out.” [Carl Sagan (1934 – 1996) was an American astronomer, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, and author.]
“He whose head is in Heaven need not fear to put his feet into the grave.” [Author unknown.]
“Guilt is perhaps the most painful companion of death.” [Coco Chanel (1883 – 1971) was a French fashion designer and founder of the Chanel brand.]
Ben Franklin wrote his own epitaph: ”The body of Benjamin Franklin, Printer, like the cover of an old book, its contents torn out and stripped of its lettering and gilding, lies here...Yet the Work itself shall not be lost; for it will, as he believed, appear once more in a new and more beautiful edition, corrected and amended by the Author." [Benjamin Franklin (ca. 1706 - 1790) was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. He was a renowned author, printer, political theorist, politician, freemason, postmaster, scientist, inventor, civic activist, statesman, and diplomat who considered himself a deist rather than a Christian.]
“A thousand times we die in one life. We crumble, break and tear apart until the layers of illusion are burned away and all that is left is the truth of who and what we really are.” [Teal Scott (1984 - ) is a new-age spiritualist blogger and founder of Headway Foundation.]
“Those who have welcomed Christ may welcome death.” [Author unknown]
“The tragedy of life is not death, but what we let die inside of us while we live.” [Norman Cousins (1915 – 1990) was an American political journalist, author, professor, and world peace advocate.]
“Life is a brief intermission between birth and death. Enjoy it.” [Author unknown]
“Death is never sudden to a saint; no guest comes unawares to him who keeps a constant table.” [George Swinnock (1627–1673) was a English nonconformist author and clergyman.]
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.” [Mark Twain (1835 – 1910) was an American author and humorist, best known for his novels The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) and its sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.]
“Life asked death, ‘Why do people love me but hate you?’ Death responded, ‘Because you are a beautiful lie and I am a painful truth.’” [Author unknown]
“Death stung himself to death when he stung Christ.” [Attributed to Philip Henry (1631 – 1696) was an English Nonconformist clergyman and diarist.]
Many of the above quotes provide their own points of application. They do not necessarily reflect the conviction or opinion of the editors of Illustration Exchange or orthodox Christianity.
Death and Dying Quotes (part 2)
“The goal of all life is death.” [Sigmund Freud (1856 – 1939) was an Austrian neurologist, now known as the father of psychoanalysis.]
“As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so a life well used brings happy death.” [Leonardo da Vinci (1452 – 1519) was an Italian polymath was primarily known as a master painter (Mona Lisa, The Last Supper), but his other areas of interest included invention, painting, sculpting, architecture, science, music, mathematics, engineering, literature, anatomy, geology, astronomy, botany, writing, history, and cartography.]
“The tragedy of life is not that it ends so soon, but that we wait so long to begin it.” [W. M. Lewis (1878 – 1945) was an American teacher, university president, and politician.]
“Death is so sure of its victory, that it gives us an entire life of advantage.” [Author unknown] ("Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?" 1 Corinthians 15:55)
“In the mouth of the lion, the cub is feeling comfort: ‘Oh, my mother is carrying me.’ But the deer is feeling fear: ‘Oh, now I’m going to die.’ So, although both the devotees and non devotees die, there is a difference of feeling at the time of death.” [Abhay Charanaravinda Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada (1896 – 1977) was a Gaudiya Vaishnava spiritual teacher (guru) and the founder Hare Krishna Movement.]
“Jesus’ death isn’t to fee us from dying, but to free us from the fear of death. Jesus came to liberate us so that we could die up front and then live. Jesus Christ wants to take us to places where only dead men and women can go. [Erwin McManus (1958 - ) is an American author, lecturer, and pastor of the modern mega-church, Mosaic in Los Angeles, CA.]
“Do not seek death. Death will find you. But seek the road which makes death a fulfillment.” [Author unknown]
“I’m the one that’s got to die when it’s time for me to die, so let me live my life the way I want to.” [Jimi Hendrix (1942-1970) was an iconic American rock star who died at the age of 27 from a drug overdose.]
“Whatever may be the mysteries of life and death, there is one mystery which the cross of Christ reveals to us, and that is the infinite and absolute goodness of God. Let all the rest remain a mystery so long as the mystery of the cross of Christ gives us faith for all the rest.” [Charles Kingsley (1819 – 1875) was a priest of the Church of England, a university professor, historian and novelist.]
“Just when the caterpillar thought its life was over, it became a butterfly.” [Author unknown]
“If you don’t live for something, you will die for nothing.” [Author unknown]
“While I thought that I was learning how to live, I have been learning How to die.” [Leonardo da Vinci (1452 – 1519) was an Italian polymath was primarily known as a master painter (Mona Lisa, The Last Supper), but his other areas of interest included invention, painting, sculpting, architecture, science, music, mathematics, engineering, literature, anatomy, geology, astronomy, botany, writing, history, and cartography.]
“Death is beautiful when seen to be a law, and not an accident — it is as common as life.” [Henry David Thoreau (1817 – 1862) was an American author, poet, philosopher,abolitionist, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, and historian.]
“We must bear our crosses; self is the greatest of them all. If we die in part every day of our lives, we shall have but little to do on the last. O how utterly will these little daily deaths destroy the power of the final dying!” [Francois Fenelon (1651 – 1715) was a French Roman Catholic archbishop, theologian, poet and writer.]
Many of the above quotes offer their own points of application. They do not necessarily reflect the opinion(s) of Illustration Exchange and its editorial staff. Nor do they necessarily reflect the position of orthodox Christianity.