'I am about to - or I am going to - die; either expression is used.'
- DOMINIQUE BOUHOURS, French grammarian

'I have spent a lot of time searching through the Bible for loopholes.'
- W.C. FIELDS, US comedian

'I feel nothing, apart from a certain difficulty in continuing to exist.'
- BERNARD FONTANELLE, French philosopher

‘Watch out, please!’
- EGON FRIEDELL, Austrian historian and writer, to a passing pedestrian before jumping out of a window in Vienna as the Gestapo knocked at his door (a wonderful example of the famous Viennese courtesy)

‘Get me my bedpan.’
- J.W. GOETHE, according to his servant (his acolytes prefer the ‘More light!’ quote)

‘God will forgive me. That’s his profession.’
- HEINRICH HEINE, German poet

'On the contrary !'
- HENRIK IBSEN, Norwegian dramatist, when his nurse told a visitor that he was feeling better

'I told you I was ill.'
- SPIKE MILLIGAN, British comedian

'I do not have to forgive my enemies, I've had them all shot.'
- RAMON MARIA NARVAEZ, Spanish general

‘I am just going outside, and may be some time.’
- LAWRENCE OATES, member of Robert F. Scott’s fatal expedition to the South Pole, before lighting his pipe and walking into a blizzard (due to his physical condition he delayed the group)

'They couldn’t hit an elephant at this dist--'
- JOHN SEDGWICK, US general

'I've had eighteen straight whiskies, I think that's a record...'
- DYLAN THOMAS

'Even in the valley of the shadow of death, two and two do not make six.'
- LEO TOLSTOY, refusing to reconcile with the church

'Now, my good man, is no time for making enemies.'
- VOLTAIRE, when asked to renounce Satan

'Either this wallpaper goes, or I do.'
- OSCAR WILDE
Alternative version:
'Alas, I am dying beyond my means' (while sipping champagne on his deathbed)