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Men that look no further than their outsides, think health an appurtenance unto life, and quarrel with their constitutions for being sick; but I that have examined the parts of man, and know upon what tender filaments that fabric hangs, do wonder that we are not always so; and considering the thousand doors that lead to death, do thank my God that we can die but once.

— Thomas Browne Religio Medici (1643)

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Notes from Wikiquote

Compare: "I know death hath ten thousand several doors For men to take their exits.", John Webster, Duchess of Malfi (1623); Act IV, scene ii.

More quotes by Thomas Browne

There is no man alone, because every man is a Microcosm, and carries the whole world about him.

Religio Medici (1643)

There is surely a piece of Divinity within us, something that was before the Elements, and owes no homage unto the Sun.

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The severe Schools shall never laugh me out of the Philosophy of Hermes, that this visible world is but a picture of the invisible.

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No man can justly censure or condemn another, because indeed no man truly knows another.

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What song the Syrens sang, or what name Achilles assumed when he hid himself among women, though puzzling questions, are not beyond all conjecture.

Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial (1658)

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Thomas Browne (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.