Epitaphs From The Classics

Epitaphs and Words of Comfort from the Classics

Listed below are example epitaphs.  For help with writing an epitaph or to talk with us about ordering a monument, headstone, flat marker or memorial plaque, call 708-544-0916.

Example Epitpahs

In His will is our peace. (Dante)
The dutifulness of children is the foundation of all virtue. (Cicero)
The heart of him who truly loves is a paradise on earth. (Lamennais)
Mutual love, the crown of all our bliss. (Milton)
Things past belong to memory alone, things future are the property of hope. (John Home)
Each lonely scene shall thee restore. (William Collins)
The acts of this life are the destiny of the next. (Eastern proverb)
Safe in the hallowed quiets of the past. (Lowell)
Every man's life is a plan of God. (Horace Bushnell)
The end and the reward of toil is rest. (James Beattie)
Till the Master of all good workmen shall set us to work anew. (Rudyard Kipling)
The kiss of the sun for pardon, the song of the birds for mirth, One's nearer God's heart in a garden, than anywhere else on earth. (Dorothy Francis Gurney)
Dust thou art, to dust returnest, was not spoken of the soul. (Longfellow)
Nature's loving proxy, the watchful mother. (Bulwer)
Mercy to him that shows it, is the rule. (Cowper)
Music, when soft voices die, vibrates in the memory... (Shelley)
Strength is born in the deep silence of long-suffering hearts, not amid joy. (Hemans)
The soul that suffers is stronger than the soul that rejoices. (E. Shepard)
Tears are often the telescope by which men see far into Heaven. (H.W. Beecher)
Strength is born in the deep silence of long-suffering hearts, not amid joy. (Hemans)
What seem to us but dim funereal tapers may be Heaven's distant lamps. (Longfellow)
Death is the golden key that opens the palace of Eternity. (Milton)
Sorrows are like tall angels with star-crowns in their hair. (Margery Eldredge Howell)
Tears are often the telescope by which men see far into Heaven. (H.W. Beecher)
To love is to place our happiness in the happiness of another. (Leibnitz)
What seem to us but dim funereal tapers may be Heaven's distant lamps. (Longfellow)
Death is the golden key that opens the palace of Eternity. (Milton)
There is a sweet joy that comes to us through sorrow. (Spurgeon)
Earth hath no sorrow that Heaven cannot heal. (Moore)
Heaven, the treasury of everlasting joy. (Shakespeare)
Death is not a foe, but an inevitable adventure. (Sir Oliver Lodge)
The soul that suffers is stronger than the soul that rejoices. (E. Shepard)
Where there is much light, the shadows are deepest. (Goethe)
There never was night that had no morn. (D.M.N. Craik)
Faith builds a bridge across the gulf of death. (Young)
Until the day break, and the shadows flee away.
"Tis not the whole of life to live, nor all of death to die. (J. Montgomery)
Where there is sorrow there is holy ground. (Wilde)
The greatest attribute of Heaven is mercy. (Beaumont and Fletcher)
Earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot heal. (Moore)
God gives us love. Something to love He lends us. (Tennyson)
His daily prayer, far better understood in acts than words, was simply doing good. (Whittier)
Unable are the loved to die, for love is immortality. (Dickenson)
Only in darkness can you see the stars. (Emerson)
It is not the length of life but the depth. (Emerson)
Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail (Emerson)
We only part to meet again (Gay)
Now twilight lets her curtain down and pins it with a star. (L.M. Child)
Onward to thy glory! 'Tis always morning somewhere in the world. (R.H. Horne)
The way to love anything is to realize that it might be lost (Chesterton)
Yet in this heart's most sacred place, thou, thou, alone, shall dwell forever. (Moore)
...There hath pass'd away a glory from the earth. (Wordsworth)
Joy, joy forever! My task is done--the gates are pass'd, and heaven is won. (Moore)
The cross leads generations on. (Shelley)
...The heart of man is restles until it finds its rest in Thee. (St. Augustine)
But in the night of death hope sees a star, and listening love can hear the rustle of a wing. (Ingersoll)
Death's but a path to be trod if man would ever pass to God. (T. Parnell)
Whither though goest, I will go. (Ruth 1: 16)
Life's a voyage that's homeward bound. (H. Melville)
He hath awakened from the dream of life. (Shelley)
Beyond is the infinite morning of a day without a tomorrow. (W.S. Abbott)
Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak whispers the o'erfraught heart and bids it break... (Shakespeare)
Where He leads me I can safely go. (Millay)
Humble love, and not proud science, keeps the door of Heaven. (Young)
God is and all is well. (Whittier)