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Tombstone Quotes

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Tombstone Quotes

“Death would not surprise us as often as it does, if we let go of the misbelief that newborns are less mortal than the elderly.”

LifeChildrenPhilosophyHumorKidsAgeFunnyDeathQuotesBeliefHumourBirthJokesHumorousPreparedSurprisePhilosopherOld AgeImmortalityLife And DeathSatireImmortalMortalityFuneralChildSurprisingAphorismDeadDieQuotationsBeliefsJokeStoicismHilariousEldersRipAphorismsHereafterOldMisconceptionOffspringFallacyNewbornLife After DeathTombstoneStoicBurialUnpreparedPhilosophicRest In PeacePrepareAphoristAphoristsKidMortalCycleFuneralsWeepTombAgedMisconceptionsBuryElderFallaciesMisbeliefGone Too SoonStoicsNewbornsMisbeliefsOld Age HomesOld Age HomeTombstonesThe HereafterPhilosophers CryThe Elders
Author:Mokokoma Mokhonoana
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“You are a cool cemetery. You have the sinner’s grave You have the saint’s earth colliding You have all the beds narrow as a knife; as if a rally of tombstones to defend death. But you can’t really postpone the inauguration of my burial, can you? From the poem - Few Words to Cemetery”

EarthDeathPoetryDarkSinPoemBedSaintGravesPoetry QuotesSinnerKnivesDeath And DyingDeadDieCemeteryGraveyardTombstoneBurialGraveCoolInaugurationSinnersCollideKnifeDefendTombCemeteriesNarrowPostponeTombstonesRally
Book:Beyond The Vernal Mind
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“Friends and relatives encouraged me to erect a gravestone for my father. I thought that even though I was not a high official, I would erect for my father a tombstone grander than any of those others. Then I recalled that in 1958, many of the village's tombstones had been dismantled for use in irrigation projects or as bases for smelting ovens in the steelmaking campaign during the Great Leap Forward; some had been laid out on roadways. The more impressive the monument, the greater the likelihood of it being demolished. My father's tombstone had to be erected not on the ground, but in my heart. A tombstone in the heart could never be demolished or trampled underfoot.”

LoveDeathFatherLossGriefFamilyCommunismStarvationFamineTombstone
Book:Tombstone: The Great Chinese Famine, 1958-1962
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“Mary Antrim non era l’unico fantasma della sua vita. Forse, rispetto alla maggioranza degli uomini, non erano molte le persone che gli erano mancate, ma per lui queste perdite avevano contato di più. Anche se non l’aveva toccato così da vicino, in un certo modo la morte aveva lasciato nel suo animo un’impronta più profonda. A poco a poco egli aveva preso l’abitudine di soffermarsi sui suoi morti ad uno ad uno, e piuttosto presto nella vita aveva cominciato a pensare che andasse fatto qualcosa per loro. E loro erano lì, accanto a lui, forti di quell’essenza semplificata, più intensa, di quell’assenza consapevole, di quella pazienza eloquente, così corporei e presenti che pareva avessero soltanto perduto l’uso della parola. Quando non li si percepiva più, quando ogni suono cessava, era come fosse ancora lì, in terra, il loro purgatorio; chiedevano così poco, poveretti, che ricevevano ancor meno, e morivano di nuovo, morivano ogni giorno del duro trattamento che riservava loro la vita. Per loro nulla era stato predisposto: non avevano prerogative né onori, nessun rifugio, nessuna salvaguardia. A provvedere ai vivi c’erano pur sempre anche i più egoisti tra gli uomini; ma nessuno, nemmeno chi era ritenuto più generoso, faceva nulla per quegli altri. E così, col passare degli anni, andò maturando in George Stransom una risoluzione: lui sì, almeno, avrebbe fatto qualcosa, l’avrebbe fatto cioè per i suoi morti; e nell’adempiere a quel sommo atto di misericordia”

DeathMourningMorteTombstoneTombeCerimony
Book:The Altar of the Dead
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“He blamed television, movies, and books for his love of ghosts. It was a fascination that’s been with him since his youth. He always loved watching or reading anything that had to do with ghosts and haunted locations, especially historic sites like New Orleans, Salem, Tombstone, Gettysburg, and Old San Juan.”

ReadingTelevisionBooksGhostsNew OrleansFascinationJason MedinaMoviesTombstoneWatching TvWatching TelevisionGettysburgSalemTribal PublicationsTribal Publications IncPrA Ghost In New OrleansSan JuanOld San JuanHaunted Locations
Book:A Ghost In New Orleans
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“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 the name of your favorite candy. In the end, all you get is a few words.”

LittlesEndsNamesBitsSpaceNumbersSecretLittle BitMeaninglessCandyCreepsFew WordsTombstoneYour FavoriteSecret LoveChisels
Book:Kiss Me or Die: A Psychological Thriller
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“When I read the epitaphs of the beautiful, every inordinate desire goes out; when I meet with the grief of parents upon a tombstone, my heart melts with compassion; when I see the tomb of the parents themselves, I consider the vanity of grieving for those whom we must quickly follow: when I see kings lying by those who deposed them, when I consider rival wits placed side by side, or the holy men that divided the world with their contests and disputes, I reflect with sorrow and astonishment on the little competitions, factions, and debates of mankind.”

MenWorldHeartLittlesBeautifulLyingDesireParentSidesGriefCompassionMankindKingsMy HeartSorrowHolyCompetitionWitDebateVanityGrievingDividedContestsDisputesRivalsTombsFactionsAstonishmentEpitaphTombstoneHoly ManHeart Melt
Book:The Spectator: With a Biographical and Critical Preface, and Explanatory Notes ...
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“I conceive disgust at those impertinent and misbecoming familiarities, inscribed upon your ordinary tombstones. Every dead man must take upon himself to be lecturing me with his odious truism, that "such as he now is, I must shortly be." Not so shortly, friend, perhaps, as thou imaginest. In the meantime I am alive. I move about. I am worth twenty of thee. Know thy betters!”

KnowsMenMovingAliveOrdinaryTwentiesTheeDisgustingFamiliarityDead ManTombstoneTruismI Am AliveLecturing
Book:Delphi Complete Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Illustrated)
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“The city itself swung slowly toward us silent as a dream. No sign of life but puffs of steam from skyscraper chimneys, the motion of the traffic. The mighty towers stood like tombstones in a graveyard, leaning against the sky and waiting for -- for what? Someday we'll know.”

KnowsDreamWaitingCitiesSkySilentSomedayTowersTrafficSteamGraveyardTombstonePuffChimneysSkyscraperSigns Of Life
Book:Slumgullion stew: an Edward Abbey reader
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“My grandmother was unsurpassable at sitting. She would sit on tombstones, glaciers, small hard benches with ants crawling over them, fragments of public monuments, other people's wheelbarrows, and when one returned one could be sure of finding her there, conversing affably with the owner of the wheelbarrow.”

PeopleHardFindingsSittingGrandmotherOwnersGrandparentMy GrandmotherFragmentsMonumentAntsBenchesCrawlingTombstoneGlaciersWheelbarrows
Book:Letters
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“I must say, some are not very beautifully made. They’re coffee-table books for people who drink alcohol. I have nothing against coffee-table books as long as they are well done. They must not look like gravestones on a table. Sometimes they are too big, they come in boxes and things like this. No, a book has to be easy to open and you don’t have to be a bodybuilder to lift it. I like books I can read in bed. Those big tombstones would kill me.”

PeopleWellsLooksLongMadeI CanBookSometimesDoneBigsEasyDrinkBedTablesBoxesAlcoholCoffeeLiftsKill MeWell DoneVery BeautifulTombstoneGravestoneI Can ReadBodybuilder
Author:Karl Lagerfeld
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“The cold hoarfrost glistened on the tombstones, and sparkled like rows of gems, among the stone carvings of the old church. The snow lay hard and crisp upon the ground; and spread over the thickly-strewn mounds of earth, so white and smooth a cover, that it seemed as if corpses lay there, hidden only by their winding sheets.”

IfsHardEarthChurchWhiteColdStonesLaysSpreadSnowSmoothSheetsCorpsesGemsSpookyTombstoneCrispsCarvingOld Churches
Book:The posthumous papers of the Pickwick Club
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“At the great iron gate of the churchyard he stopped and looked in. He looked up at the high tower spectrally resisting the wind, and he looked round at the white tombstones, like enough to the dead in their winding-sheets, and he counted the nine tolls of the clock-bell.”

EnoughWhiteWindRoundsNineClockIronGatesBellsTowersSheetsResistingTollsSpookyTombstone
Book:Charles Dickens's works. Charles Dickens ed. [18 vols. of a 21 vol. set. Wanting A child's history of England; Christmas stories; The mystery of Edwin Drood].
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“Surely with as good reason as had Archimedes to have the cylinder, cone and sphere engraved on his tombstone might our distinguished countrymen leave testamentary directions for the cubic eikosiheptagram to be engraved on theirs. Spirit of the Universe! wither are we drifting, and when, where, and how is all this to end?”

EndsReasonMightScienceSpiritUniverseMathematicsSpheresDistinguishedDriftingCountrymenTombstoneConesEngravedCylinders
Book:1854-1973
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“... the structure of our public morality crashed to earth. Above its grave a tombstone read, "Be tolerant--even of evil." Logically the next step would be to say to our commonwealth's criminals, "I disagree that it's all right to rob and murder, but naturally I respect your opinion." Tolerance is only complacence when it makes no distinction between right and wrong.”

Would BeEarthEvilNextStepsOpinionMoralityMurderStructureCriminalsToleranceGravesDistinctionDisagreeNext StepsCommonwealthTombstone
Book:The Desegregated Heart: A Virginian's Stand in Time of Transition
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“Human beings have got a lot of good, noble impulses inside them, and most people want to be good and do more good than they do evil. Hell, we've had nuclear weapons now for thirty or thirty-five years and nothing's happened yet. That in itself seems to be a miracle. If Reagan pushes the button or somebody pushes the button in Russia or somebody pushes it in Costa Rica, they can put a big tombstone in outer space that says, "We gave it a good try." Because we have.”

PeopleIfsWantTryingYearsHumansBigsSeemsEvilPresidentHuman BeingsSpaceHellHappenedWeaponsMiracleBe GoodNobleNuclearRussiaImpulseNuclear WeaponsButtonsOuter SpaceTombstoneAmerican PresidentCosta Rica
Author:Stephen King
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“The old dead trees are the most fascinating - the countless trees lying in the gullies and up the hills that fell perhaps a century ago, pulling up their roots from the earth as they toppled. The great upheavals left rocks in their huge tentacles and, as they slowly rot, the trunks are home to populations of creatures, from goannas to wild pigs. As grey as tombstones in a cemetery they lie there, having outlasted generations of farmers, as they'll outlast me. In their own way they are as beautiful, more beautiful, than living trees.”

WayHomeEarthBeautifulLyingLeftBeautyGenerationsTreeRocksCenturyHugeCreaturesRootsPopulationHillsFascinatingFarmersPigsPullingGreyCemeteryTrunksTombstoneUpheavalFloraTentaclesDead Trees
Author:Phillip Adams
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“As I never saw my father or my mother, and never saw any likeness of either of them (for their days were long before the days of photographs), my first fancies regarding what they were like, were unreasonably derived from their tombstones. The shape of the letters on my father's, gave me an odd idea that he was a square, stout, dark man, with curly black hair. From the character and turn of the inscription, "Also Georgiana Wife of the Above", I drew a childish conclusion that my mother was freckled and sickly.”

MenFirstsLongIdeasCharacterMotherTurnsFatherBlackDarkSawsWifeHairShapesLettersPhotographConclusionOddFancySquaresTombstoneInscriptionsStoutBlack Hair
Book:Delphi Complete Works of Charles Dickens (Illustrated)
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