Truth sits upon the lips of dying men.
Matthew Arnold
Last Words of
Famous People
This is the last of earth! I am content.
John Quincy Adams
See in what peace a Christian can die.
Joseph Addison
“What think ye of Heaven and Glory that is at the back of the cross?” The hope of this makes me look upon pale death as a lovely messenger to me. I bless the Lord for my lot this day … Friends, give our Lord credit; He is aye good, but O! He is good in a day of trial, and He will be sweet company through the ages of eternity.
Archibald Alison
I am not come hither to deny my Lord and Master.
Anne Askew, July 16, 1545, burned at the stake after torture on the rack, at the age of 25
Nothing, but death.
Jane Austen, when asked by her sister, Cassandra, if there was anything she wanted.
I can’t sleep.
James M. Barrie
I have pain (there is no arguing against sense); but I have peace, I have peace.
Richard Baxter
Now comes the mystery.
Henry Ward Beecher
Friends applaud, the Comedy is over.
Ludwig von Beethoven
I beg you, dearest brethren, love one another.
Bernard of Clairvaux
While women weep, as they do now, I’ll fight; while men go to prison, in and out, in and out, as they do now, I’ll fight; where there is a drunkard left, while there is a poor lost girl upon the streets, where there remains one dark soul without the light of God – I’ll fight! I’ll fight to the very end.
William Booth, end of his last speech
I am about to – or I am going to – die; either expression is used.
Dominique Bouhours, French grammarian
Be of good comfort, brother, for we shall have a merry supper with the Lord this night.
John Bradford, 1510–1555, to fellow martyr, John Leaf, at the stake, Smithfield
I was a little better than speechless all day. O my God, I am speedily coming to thee! Hasten the day, O Lord, if it be thy blessed will. Oh, come, Lord Jesus, come quickly.
David Brainerd
Oh, I am not going to die, am I? He will not separate us, we have been so happy.
Charlotte Brontë, spoken to her husband of nine months, Rev. Arthur Nicholls
This is a beautiful country.
John Brown
Beautiful.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, in reply to her husband who had asked how she felt
I am going to a place where few kings and great men will come.
Buchanan, tutor to James I
I don’t feel good.
Luther Burbank
“Though I have endeavored to avoid sin, and to please God to the utmost of my power, yet, from the consciousness of perpetual infirmities, I am still afraid to die. [His chaplain replied: “My Lord, you have forgotten that Jesus Christ is a Savior.”] True, but how shall I know that he is a Savior for me? [“My Lord,” answered the chaplain, “it is written, ‘Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.’”] True, and I am surprised that, although I have read that scripture a thousand times over, I have never felt its virtue till this moment; and now I die happy.
Joseph Butler
Thou, Lord, bruisest me, but I am abundantly satisfied, since it is from thy hand.
John Calvin
When I am gone, speak less of Dr Carey and more of Dr Carey’s Savior.
William Carey, the missionary
This is the most joyful day that ever I saw in my pilgrimage on earth. My joy is now begun which I see shall never be interrupted … It is nearly thirty years since He made it sure … I have followed holiness, I have taught truth, and I have been most in the main things … This day I am to seal with my blood all the truths that ever I preached … I had a great sweetness of spirit and great submission as to my taking, the Providence of God was so eminent in it; and I could not but think that God judged it necessary for His glory to bring me to such an end, seeing he loosed me from such a work. The Lord knows I go up this ladder with less fear, confusion or perturbation of mind, than ever I entered a pulpit to preach.
Donald Cargill, 27 July 1681
I know now that patriotism is not enough; I must have no hatred and no bitterness toward anyone.
Edith Cavell
In the end, everything is a gag.
Charlie Chaplin
The issue is now clear. It is between light and darkness and everyone must choose his side.
G.K. Chesterton
Goodbye, Everybody!
Hart Crane, poet, who committed suicide by jumping overboard during a steamship voyage
This was the hand that wrote it, therefore it shall suffer the first punishment.
Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, burnt at the stake in 1555
Lord, however Thou dispose of me, continue and go on to do good for them. Pardon Thy foolish people! Forgive their sins and do not forsake them, but love and bless them. Give them consistency of judgment, one heart, and mutual love; and go on to deliver them, and with the work of reformation; and make the name of Christ glorious in the world. Teach those who look too much on Thy instruments, to depend more upon Thyself … And pardon the folly of this short prayer. And give me rest for Jesus Christ’s sake, to whom, with Thee and Thy Holy Spirit, be all honor and glory, now and forever! Amen.
Oliver Cromwell
Show my head to the people, it is worth seeing.
George Danton, to his executioner
These are the last words of David:
‘When one rules over men in
righteousness,
when he rules in the fear of God,
he is like the light of morning at sunrise
on a cloudless morning,
like the brightness after rain
that brings the grass from the earth.
… But evil men are all to be cast aside like thorns,
which are not gathered with the hand.
Whoever touches thorns
uses a tool of iron or the shaft of a spear;
they are burned up where they lie.”
David, The Bible, 2 Samuel 23:1, 4, 6–7
… the fog is rising.
Emily Dickinson
Weep not, I shall not die; and as I leave the land of the dying I trust to see the blessings of the Lord in the land of the living.
Edward the Confessor
I have sinned against my brother the ass. … Welcome, Sister Death!
Francis of Assisi
More light!
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Here die I, Richard Grenville, with a joyful and quiet mind, that I have ended my life as a true soldier ought to do that hath fought for his country, Queen, religion and honor. Whereby my soul most joyfully departeth out of this body, and shall always leave behind it an everlasting fame of a valiant and true soldier that hath done his duty as he was bound to do.
Richard Grenville
I am more fortunate than the Great Marquis, [Archibald Campbell, Marquis of Argyle] for my Lord was beheaded, but I am to be hanged on a tree as my Savior was. I take God to record upon my soul, I would not exchange this scaffold with the palace and miter of the greatest prelate in Britain. Blessed be God who has shown mercy to me such a wretch, and has revealed His Son in me, and made me a minister of the everlasting gospel, and that He hath deigned, in the midst of much contradiction from Satan, and the world, to seal my ministry upon the hearts of not a few of His people, and especially in the station where I was last, I mean the congregation and presbytery of Stirling. Jesus Christ is my Life and my Light, my Righteousness, my strength, and my Salvation and all my desire. Him! O Him, I do with all the strength of my soul commend to you. Bless Him, O my soul, from henceforth even forever. Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation. “Art not Thou from everlasting, O Lord my God. I shall not die but live.” The Covenants! The Covenants! They shall yet be Scotland’s reviving. Be not afraid at His sweet, lovely and desirable cross, for although I have not been able because of my wounds to lift up or lay down my head, but as I was helped, yet I was never in better case all my life. He has not given me one challenge since I came to prison, for anything less or more; but on the contrary He has so wonderfully shined on me with the sense of His redeeming, strengthening, assisting, supporting, through-bearing, pardoning and reconciling love, grace and mercy, that my soul doth long to be freed of bodily infirmities and earthly organs, that so I may flee to His Royal Palace even the Heavenly Habitation of my God, where I am sure of a crown put on my head, and a palm put in my hand, and a new song in my mouth, even the song of Moses and of the Lamb, that so I may bless, praise, magnify and extol Him for what He hath done to me and for me. Wherefore I bid farewell to all my dear fellow-sufferers for the testimony of Jesus, who are wandering in dens and caves. Farewell, my children, study holiness in all your ways, and praise the Lord for what He hath done for me, and tell all my Christian friends to praise Him on my account. Farewell, sweet Bible, and wanderings and contendings for truth. Welcome, death. Welcome, the City of my God where I shall see Him and be enabled to serve Him eternally with full freedom. Welcome, blessed company, the angels and spirits of just men made perfect. But above all, welcome, welcome, welcome, our glorious and alone God, Father, Son and Holy Ghost; into Thy hands I commit my spirit for Thou art worthy. Amen.
James Guthrie, 1 June 1661
Now farewell, lovely and sweet Scriptures, which were aye my comfort in the midst of all my difficulties! Farewell, faith! Farewell, hope! Farewell, wanderers, who have been comfortable to my soul, in the hearing of them commend Christ’s love! Farewell, brethren! Farewell, sisters! Farewell, Christian acquaintances! Farewell, sun, moon and stars! And, now, welcome my lovely, heartsome Christ Jesus, into whose hands I commit my spirit throughout all eternity. I may say, few and evil have the days of the years of my life been, I being about twenty years of age.
Marion Harvie, executed 26 January 1681
Dieu me pardonnera. C’est son métier. (God will forgive me. It’s his job.)
Heinrich Heine
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.
Matthew Henry
How thankful I am for death! It is the passage to the Lord and giver of eternal life. O welcome, welcome death! Thou mayest well be reckoned among the treasures of the Christian! To live is Christ, but to die is gain! Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy most holy and comfortable Word; for mine eyes have seen thy precious salvation.
James Hervey
I shall be glad then to find a hole to creep out of the world at.
Thomas Hobbes
Let nothing cause thy heart to fail;
Launch out thy boat, hoist up thy sail,
Put from the shore;
And be sure thou shalt attain
Unto the port that shall remain
For evermore.
John Hooper, written the night before his execution as a heretic in 1555
And now, in keeping with Channel 40’s policy of always bringing you the latest in blood and guts, in living color, you’re about to see another first – an attempted suicide.
Chris Hubbock, who shot herself during a broadcast
You are now going to burn a goose [the meaning of Huss’s name in Bohemian], but in a century you will have a swan whom you can neither roast nor boil. O holy simplicity!
John Huss, to his executioner [Martin Luther, who came about a hundred years after him, had a swan for his coat of arms.]
John Huss
Let us pass over the river and rest under the shade of the trees.
General T.J. “Stonewall” Jackson; wounded by his own men
This is the fourth?
Thomas Jefferson
Seven last sayings of Jesus:
.
“Today shalt thou be with me in paradise” Luke 23:43.
“Woman, behold thy Son” John 19:26.
“My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Mark 15:34
“I thirst” John 19:28
“It is finished” John 19:30
“Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit” Luke 23:46 (kjv)
God bless you!
Samuel Johnson
I am not tired of my work, neither am I tired of the world; yet when Christ calls me home, I shall go with the gladness of a boy bounding away from school.
Adoniram Judson
You have conquered, O Galilean.
The emperor Julian
Such is life.
Ned Kelly, before being hung at Old Melbourne Gaol
Live in Christ, live in Christ, and the flesh need not fear death.
John Knox
Be of good comfort, Master Ridley, and play the man; we shall this day light such a candle, by God’s grace, in England, as I trust shall never be put out … Father of heaven, receive my soul!
Hugh Latimer
Away with these filthy garments. I feel a sacred fire kindled in my soul, which will destroy everything contrary to itself, and burn as a flame of divine love to all eternity.
William Law
I give my dying testimony to the truth of Christianity. The promises of the gospel are my support and consolation. They, alone, yield me satisfaction in a dying hour. I am not afraid to die. The gospel of Christ has raised me above the fear of death; for I know that my redeemer liveth.
John Leland
Abe, I’m going to leave you now and I shall not return. I want you to be kind to your mother and live as I have taught you. Love your heavenly Father and keep his commandments.
Thomas Lincoln, father of nine-year-old Abraham Lincoln
Do not pray for healing. Do not hold me back from the glory.
Dr D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, words written on a scrap of paper a few days before his death (on March 1, 1981) after he had lost the power of speech. Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones had pastored Westminster Chapel, London, from 1939 to 1968.
God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. [Repeated three times.]
Martin Luther
I’m so thankful for active obedience of Christ. No hope without it.
J. Gresham Machen
Go on, get out. Last words are for fools who haven’t said enough.
Karl Marx, dying words to his housekeeper
God gave me a message to deliver and a horse to ride. Alas, I have killed the horse and now I cannot deliver the message.
Robert Murray M’Cheyne, as he lay dying, aged 29
You will tell the others 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.
F.B. Meyer
Earth is receding; heaven is approaching. This is my crowning day!
D.L. Moody
Too kind – too kind!
Florence Nightingale, when presented on her deathbed with the Order of Merit
My soul doth magnify the Lord! my soul doth magnify the Lord! I have longed these sixteen years to seal the precious cause and interest of precious Christ with my blood. And now, now He hath answered and granted my request, and has left me no more ado but to come here and pour forth my last prayers, sing forth my last praise to Him in time on this sweet and desirable scaffold, mount that ladder, and then I shall quickly get home to my Father’s House, see, enjoy, serve and sing forth the praises of my glorious Redeemer, for evermore world without end.
John Nisbet
See now, I commend my soul to God for whom I am an ambassador because he chose me for this task, despite my obscurity, to be one of the least among his servants. This is my confession before I die.
St Patrick
Lord, help my poor soul.
Edgar Allan Poe
Drink to me.
Pablo Picasso
Even such is time which takes in trust
Our youth, our joys, and all we have
And pays us but with age and dust:
Who in the dark and silent grave
When we have wandered all our ways
Shuts up the glory of our days.
And from the earth and grave and dust
The Lord shall raise me up, I trust.
Walter Raleigh, written on the day before he was beheaded
So little done, so much to do.
Cecil Rhodes
Why yes: a bulletproof vest.
James Rodges, murderer, when asked for his final request before facing the firing squad
Eternal Being! The soul that I am going to give you back is as pure, at this moment, as it was when it proceeded from you: render it partaker of your felicity!
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Neither my imprisonment nor fear of death have been able to discompose me in any degree. On the contrary I have found the assurances of the love and mercy of God, in and through my blessed Redeemer, in whom I only trust. And I do not question but I am going to partake of that fulness of joy which is in his presence; the hopes of which do so wonderfully delight me, that I think this is the happiest time of my life, though others may look upon it as the saddest.
William Russell
If he should slay me ten thousand times, ten thousand times I’ll trust. I feel, I feel, I believe in joy and rejoice; I feed on manna. O for arms to embrace him! O for a well-tuned harp!
Samuel Rutherford
Sir Walter Scott expressed the wish, as he lay dying, that I should read to him, and when I asked him from what book, he said, “Need you ask? There is but one.” I chose the fourteenth chapter of St John’s Gospel. Then Sir Walter Scott said, “Well, this is great comfort.”
J.G. Lockhart, Life of Sir Walter Scott
They couldn’t hit an elephant at this dist …
John B. Sedgwick, general, 1864
Love my memory; cherish my friends; but above all, govern your will and affection by the will and word of your Creator; in my beholding the end of this world, with all her vanities.
Philip Sidney
I wish to be alone, with my God, and to lie before him as a poor, wretched, hell-deserving sinner … But I would also look to him as my all-forgiving God – and as my all-sufficient God and as my all-atoning God – and as my covenant-keeping God … I would lie here to the last, at the foot of the cross, looking unto Jesus; and go as such into the presence of my God … Jesus Christ is all in all for my soul, and now you must be all for my body. I cannot tell you any longer what I want. My principles were not founded on fancies or enthusiasm; there is a reality in them, and I find them sufficient to support me in death.
Charles Simeon
Farewell, all created enjoyments, pleasures and delights; farewell, sinning and suffering; farewell, praying and believing, and welcome, heaven and singing. Welcome, joy in the Holy Ghost; welcome, Father, Son and Holy Ghost; into Thy hands I commend my spirit. I have one word more to say, and that is, to all that have any love to God and His righteous cause, that they will set time apart, and sing a song of praise to the Lord, for what He has done to my soul, and my soul says, “To Him be the praise.”
Walter Smith, 27 July 1681
Crito, I owe a cock to Æsculapius; will you remember to pay the debt?
Socrates, as he died of poisoning (a cock used to be sacrificed as a thanksgiving offering to the god of healing, Æsculapius)
My son, may you be more fortunate than your father; in all else be like him; then you will be no base man.
Sophocles
What is the answer? In that case, what is the question?
Gertrude Stein
And they stoned Stephen as he was calling on God and saying, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.”
Stephen, Acts 7:59
I have taken a look into eternity. Oh, if I could come back and preach again, how differently would I preach from what I have done before!
Summerfield
“I am so weak that I can hardly write, I cannot read my Bible, I cannot even pray, I can only lie still in God’s arms like a little child, and trust.”
Hudson Taylor
The hour I have long wished for is now come.
Teresa of Avila
I am ready to die for my Lord, that in my blood the Church may obtain liberty and peace.
Thomas à Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury
The sky is clear; there is no cloud; come, Lord Jesus, come quickly.
Augustus Toplady
Don’t let it end like this. Tell them I said something.
Pancho Villa
I am abandoned by God and man … Doctor, I will give you half of what I am worth, if you will give me six months’ life. (The doctor answered, “Sir, you cannot live six weeks.) Then I shall go to hell, and you will go with me!
Voltaire
I still live.
Daniel Webster
Go away … I’m alright.
H.G. Wells
I shall be satisfied with thy likeness – satisfied, satisfied.
Charles Wesley
The best of all is, God is with us. Farewell!
John Wesley
My doctor at last has given what has been his real diagnosis of my illness for weeks – an inoperable case of cancer. Now if he had been a Christian he wouldn’t have been so dilatory or shaken, for he would have known, as you and I do, that life or death is equally welcome when we live in the will and presence of the Lord. If the Lord has chosen me to go to Him soon, I go gladly. Please do not give a moment’s grief for me. I do not say a cold goodbye but rather a warm Auf Wiedersehen till I see you again – in the blessed land where I may be allowed to draw aside a curtain when you enter. With a heart full of love for every individual of you.
(Signed) Effie Jane Wheeler
I am tired in the Lord’s work, but not tired of it.
George Whitefield
Ah, well, then I suppose I shall have to die beyond my means.
Oscar Wilde
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