Here the whole world (stars, water, air,And field, and forest, as they wereReflected in a single mind)Like cast off clothes was left behindIn ashes, yet with hopes that she,Re-born from holy poverty,In lenten lands, hereafter...

Which epitaph would you choose for your grave-stone: “He made lots of money.” or “He saved the Earth”? And don’t think I’m being sarcastic, because for once, I’m not. We’re all going to die. What...

What’s fame, after all? It can be what someone writes on your tombstone.

I tried and failed. I tried again and again and succeeded.[Epitaph from Gail Borden’s gravestone.]

He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad.

Here was buried Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of American Independence, of the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom, and Father of the University of Virginia.[Epitaph, upon his instructions to erect a ‘a plain...

That would be a good thing for them to cut on my tombstone: Wherever she went, including here, it was against her better judgment.

I’m a survivor, ” I said. But I didn’t think that claim would carry much weight in an obituary.

Then on your tombstone, where you only get a little bit of space to sum up your life, some wax-faced creep chisels a set of meaningless numbers instead of poetry or a secret love or...

If, after I depart this vale, you ever remember me and have thought to please my ghost, forgive some sinner and wink your eye at some homely girl.

When I die of heart failure the next time you frighten me like that, you can put that on my gravestone —‘I didn’t mean to startle her

Carve your name on hearts, not tombstones. A legacy is etched into the minds of others and the stories they share about you.

It had been a bad trip … fast and wild in some moments, slow and dirty in others, but on balance it looked like a bummer. On my way back to San Francisco, I tried...

The highest tribute to the dead is not grief but gratitude.

The VoyagerWe are all lonely voyagers sailing on life’s ebb tide,To a far off place were all stripling warriors have died,Sometime at eve when the tide is low,The voices call us back to the rippling...

Here lies Dobby, a free elf.

[When asked what he wants for his tombstone epitaph]Since I’m an atheist, and have no belief whatsoever in life after death, I couldn’t care less — it’s not like it’ll have any impact on me,...

All things considered, the happiest epitaph to have etched on one’s headstone is this: ‘He never knew what hit him’.

Would you like me to [kill you] now?” asked Snape, his voice heavy with irony. “Or would you like a few moments to compose an epitaph?

Reader one moment stop and think,That I am in eternity and you are on the brink.

Epitaph.Not next year, not the next one, Not the year after that. But agesFrom here,Clad in love stained sleeping bags,Dying with feet wrapped in endlessShirts and pillow cases,Crumbling with 99 flakes clutched Between thumb and...

Science has never killed or persecuted a single person for doubting or denying its teaching, and most of these teaching have been true; but religion has murdered millions for doubting or denying her dogmas and...

Death is a debt to Nature dueWhich we have paid and so must you.

I never understood why when you died, you didn’t just vanish, everything should just keep going on the way it was only you just wouldn’t be there. I always thought I’d like my own tombstone...

Her close friends have gathered.Lord, ain’t it a shameGrieving togetherSharing the blame.But when she was dyingLord, we let her down.There’s no use cryin’It can’t help her now.The party’s all overDrink up and go home.It’s too...

Live your epitaph

A tomb now suffices him for whom the world was not enough.[Alexander’s tombstone epitaph]

My life will end someday, but it will end at my convenience.

To live in hearts we leave behind is not to die.

One of the great Confederate combat leaders, General John B. Gordon, had sat at his horse and spoken farewell to his men. Some he had seen weeping as they folded burnt and shot-pierced battle flags...

I used to measure the skies, now I measure the shadows of Earth.Although my mind was sky-bound, the shadow of my body lies here.[Epitaph he composed for himself a few months before he died]

Coelorum perrupit claustra.He broke through the barriers of the skies.[Herschel’s epitaph]