I know that I shall die struggling for breath, and I know that I shall be horribly afraid. I know that I shall not be able to keep myself from regretting bitterly the life that has brought me to such a pass; but I disown that regret. I now, weak, old, diseased, poor, dying, hold still my soul in my hands, and I regret nothing.

The dead look so terribly dead when they're dead.

It is clear that men accept an immediate pain rather than an immediate pleasure, but only because they expect a greater pleasure in the future. Often the pleasure is illusory, but their error in calculation is no refutation of the rule. You are puzzled because you cannot get over the idea that pleasures are only of the sense; but, child, a man who dies for his country dies because he likes it as surely as a man eats pickled cabbage because he likes it.

A little smoke lost in the air, that was the life of a man.

I [Death] was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.

Dying is the most hellishly boresome experience in the world! Particularly when it entails dying of 'natural causes'.