Steven Biko Quotes

Every man dies. Not every man really lives.

Whether by a Mack truck or by heart failure or faulty lungs, death happens. But life isn't really just about avoiding death, is it? It's about living.

Every man dies. Not every man lives.

We don't beat the reaper by living longer, we beat the reaper by living well and living fully.

I'm gonna live till I die.

Every existing thing is born without reason, prolongs itself out of weakness, and dies by chance.

Achieving life is not the equivalent of avoiding death.

some men never die and some men never live but we're all alive tonight.

Give life long enough and it will solve all your problems, including the one of being alive.

Don't be afraid of death so much as an inadequate life.

Unbeing dead isn't being alive.

When you're dead, you're dead. No one is going to remember me when I'm dead. Oh, maybe a few friends will remember me affectionately. Being remembered isn't the most important thing, anyhow. It's what you do when you are here that's important.

If there's a fire, I want to be there. Maybe because in being so close to death, I think I understand what it means to be truly alive.

The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.

Do not take life too seriously. You will never get out of it alive.

All of us want to live, and that is absolutely natural. However, we should learn from childhood on to choose our best way to die. If we don't do that, we end up spending our days like a dog, only in search of harbour, food and expressing a blind loyalty to his owner in return. That isn't enough to make our lives have a meaning.

When I'm lying in my bed I think about life and I think about death and neither one particularly appeals to me.

Who cares about great marks left behind? We have one life... just one. Our life. We have nothing else.

Life is the game that must be played, this truth at least, good friends, we know; so live and laugh, nor be dismayed as one by one the phantoms go.

Life is short, the art long.

An insatiable appetite for glory leads to sacrifice and death, but innate instinct leads to self-preservation and life.

You live till you die, and that's the end of it. What good is your legacy when you are dead? I worry about being alive, selling work, having fun, moving and doing things when I am alive.

I'm not interested in my legacy. I made up a word: 'live-acy.' I'm more interested in living.

I know that one day I'm going to die. I want to accomplish as much as I can before I do.

I am only here on this earth for a short period of time, like the rest of the country and citizens, and I want the time that I spend here on earth to matter.