DEATHS, ATHEISTS
… taking vengeance on them that know not Cod, and that obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.
—II Timothy 1:8
1016 Bartholomew Was On Conscience
The last words of Charles IX, who ordered the massacre on St. Bartholomew’s Day, were: “What blood! what murders! I know not where I am. How will all this end? What shall I do? I am lost forever. I know it.”
1017 To Prefer Hell
Altamont the infidel, cried out his last words: “My principles have poisoned my friend; my extravagance has beggared my boy; my unkindness has murdered my wife. And is there another hell? Oh, thou blasphemed, yet most indulgent Lord God! Hell is a refuge if it hides me from thy frown.”
1018 “You Need Not Tell Me”
Sir Francis Newport, the head of an English infidel club, said to those gathered around his dying bed, “You need not tell me there is no God for I know there is one, and that I am in His angry presence! You need not tell me there is no hell, for I already feel my soul slipping into its fires! Wretches, cease your idle talk about there being hope for me! I know I am lost forever.”
—Sunday School Times
1019 So, It Is True!
A newspaper article referred to a striking story in an anonymous book of memoirs published not long ago. The writer met the woman who nursed the great agnostic, Professor J. H. Huxley, through his last illness. She said that as he lay dying the great skeptic suddenly looked up at some sight invisible to mortal eyes, and, staring a while, whispered at last, “So it is true.”
—Reginald Kirby
1020 Ingersoll’s Hope
The infidel, Robert Ingersoll, when standing at the grave of his brother, said, “Life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of two eternities. We strive in vain to look beyond the height. We cry aloud, and the only answer is the echo of our wailing cry. From the voiceless lips of the unreplying dead there comes no word. But in the night of death hope sees a star and listening love can hear the rustle of a wing!”
1021 Stalin’s Terrible Death
Quoted in Newsweek is Svetlana Stalin’s description of her father’s death. We quote: “My father died a difficult and terrible death … God grants an easy death only to the just. … At what seemed the very last moment he suddenly opened his eyes and cast a glance over everyone in the room. It was a terrible glance, insane or perhaps angry and full of fear of death … Then he lifted his left hand as though he were pointing to something above and bringing down a curse on us all. The gesture was full of menace … The next moment … the spirit wrenched itself free of the flesh.”
1022 “Death Not My Concern”
Said the Greek philosopher Epicurus, “While I am, death is not; and when death is, I am not. Therefore, death is no concern to me.”
1023 Man To The End
Lord Byron, an infidel to the end, exclaimed on his deathbed: “Shall I sue for mercy?” After a long pause, he added, “Come, come, no weakness; let’s be a man to the last.”
1024 Go To Hell!
Voltaire, on his deathbed, addressed his doctor: “I am abandoned by God and man. I will give you half of what I am worth, if you will give me six months’ life.” The doctor replied, “Sir, you cannot live six weeks.” Voltaire replied, “Then I shall go to hell, and you will go with me.” Soon after he expired.
See also: Atheists.