Death, when it approaches, ought not to take one by surprise. It should be part of the full expectancy of life. Without an ever-present sense of death life is insipid.

Death is a convention, a certification to the end of pain, something for the vital statistics book, not binding upon anyone but the keepers of graveyard records.

Death is not anything ... death is not ... It's the absence of presence, nothing more ... the endless time of never coming back ... a gap you can't see, and when the wind blows through it, it makes no sound.

There is no God found stronger than death; and death is a sleep.

Old men must die, or the world would grow mouldy, would only breed the past again.

When we are dead Rugs are no richer than a quick-thorn bed.

A creditor is worse than a master; for a master owns only your person, a creditor owns your dignity and can belabour that.

If thy debtor be honest and capable, thou hast thy money again, if not with increase, with praise; if he prove insolvent, don't ruin him to get that which it will not ruin thee to lose, for thou art but a steward.

A small loan makes a debtor; a great one, an enemy.

Words pay no debts.