In the end, we are all just stories waiting to be told.

Ah, my Beloved, fill the Cup that clears TO-DAY of past Regrets and future Fears: To-morrow!—Why, To-morrow I may be Myself with Yesterday's Sev'n thousand Years.

It seems to me that if you or I must choose between two courses of thought or action, we should remember our dying and try so to live that our death brings no pleasure to the world.