“A useless life is an early death.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Iphigenia in Tauris

Ein unnütz Leben ist ein früher Tod...
Act I, sc. ii
Iphigenie auf Tauris (1787)

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Johann Wolfgang von Goethe185

German writer, artist, and politician 1749–1832

Yuan Mei

"Miscellaneous Poems" III, quoted in Albert Davis (ed.), The Penguin Book of Chinese Verse (1962), p. 67

“Man alone, it seems, lives all his life in the knowledge of death. And yet there is more to life than merely waiting for death. For life to have meaning, there must be a purpose. A man must pass something on — otherwise he is useless.”

David Gemmell book Legend

Source: Drenai series, Legend, Pt 1: Against the Horde, Ch. 29

“It is written that the last enemy to be vanquished is death. We should begin early in life to vanquish this enemy by obliterating every trace of the fear of death from our minds.”

Felix Adler (1851–1933) German American professor of political and social ethics, rationalist, and lecturer

Section 8 : Suffering and Consolation
Founding Address (1876), Life and Destiny (1913)
Context: It is written that the last enemy to be vanquished is death. We should begin early in life to vanquish this enemy by obliterating every trace of the fear of death from our minds. Then can we turn to life and fill the whole horizon of our souls with it, turn with added zest toall the serious tasks which it imposes and to the pure delights which here and there it affords.

“Life is a useless passion.”

Jean Paul Sartre book Being and Nothingness

Part 4, Chapter 2, III
Variant: Man is a useless passion.
Source: Being and Nothingness (1943)

“A mans fame and hayre grow most after death, and are both equally uselesse.”

George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham (1628–1687) English statesman and poet

Source: Commonplace book, P. 268

“The age-old faith of lovers and poets in the power of love, stronger than death, that Finis vitae sed non amoris [Life ends but not love], is a lie, useless and not even funny.”

Stanisław Lem book Solaris

Source: Solaris (1961), Ch. 14: "The Old Mimoid", p. 204

“Time goes by so fast. Nothin' can outrun it. Death commences too early--almost before you're half-acquainted with life--you meet the other.”

Tennessee Williams Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

Source: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

“We come unbidden into this life, and if we are lucky we find a purpose beyond starvation, misery, and early death which, lest we forget, is the common lot.”

Abraham Verghese book Cutting for Stone

Source: Cutting for Stone

“I have lived with the prospect of an early death for the last 49 years. I'm not afraid of death, but I'm in no hurry to die.”

Stephen Hawking (1942–2018) British theoretical physicist, cosmologist, and author

As quoted in "Stephen Hawking: 'There is no heaven; it's a fairy story'" by Ian Sample, in The Guardian (15 May 2011) http://www.theguardian.com/science/2011/may/15/stephen-hawking-interview-there-is-no-heaven <br class="br">Context: I have lived with the prospect of an early death for the last 49 years. I'm not afraid of death, but I'm in no hurry to die. I have so much I want to do first... I regard the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail. There is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers; that is a fairy story for people afraid of the dark.

“The early morning belongs to the Church of the risen Christ. At the break of light it remembers the morning on which death and sin lay prostrate in defeat and new life and salvation were given to mankind”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945) German Lutheran pastor, theologian, dissident anti-Nazi

Source: Life Together: The Classic Exploration of Christian Community

“A useless life is an early death.”

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Johann Wolfgang von Goethe185

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