Top 30 Farewell Quotes of All Time
Life is full of goodbyes. People move, switch jobs, end relationships, retire, and ultimately leave this world. It’s no wonder, then, that people have found many ways to say farewell over the years.
That’s why, when it’s time to say goodbye in the present, it’s often helpful to draw on the vast eloquence of the past. In times of great change, it can be hard to find the words to express the strong emotions we feel and/or sum up a period of our life that’s coming to a close. A famous quote – whether it’s funny, inspirational, or melancholy – often says it best.
Here’s our list of the top 30 farewell quotes and sayings of all time. Use these powerful sentiments to cap off a goodbye letter to colleagues, friends, or anyone else. Or just read them, and take solace in the fact that other people have been in your shoes.
- “The two hardest things to say in life are hello for the first time and goodbye for the last.”
Moira Rogers
- “There are no goodbyes for us. Wherever you are, you will always be in my heart.”
Mahatma Gandhi
- “You have been my friend. That in itself is a tremendous thing.”
E.B. White (Charlotte’s Web)
- “If you’re brave enough to say goodbye, life will reward you with a new hello.”
Paulo Coelho
- “This is not a goodbye, my darling, this is a thank you.”
Nicholas Sparks (Message in a Bottle)
- “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.”
Dr. Seuss
- “Man’s feelings are always purest and most glowing in the hour of meeting and of farewell.”
Jean Paul Richter
- “Great is the art of beginning, but greater is the art of ending.”
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
- “Goodbyes are only for those who love with their eyes. Because for those who love with heart and soul there is no such thing as separation.”
Rumi
- “How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard.”
A.A. Milne (Winnie-the-Pooh)
- “What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from.”
T.S. Eliot
- “Don’t be dismayed at goodbyes. A farewell is necessary before you can meet again. And meeting again, after moments or lifetimes, is certain for those who are friends.”
Richard Bach
- “Why can’t we get all the people together in the world that we really like and then just stay together? I guess that wouldn’t work. Someone would leave. Someone always leaves. Then we would have to say good-bye. I hate good-byes. I know what I need. I need more hellos.”
Charles M. Schulz
- “It’s time to say goodbye, but I think goodbyes are sad and I’d much rather say hello. Hello to a new adventure.”
Ernie Harwell
- “All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another.”
Anatole France
- “Never say goodbye because goodbye means going away and going away means forgetting.”
J.M. Barrie (Peter Pan)
- “We’ll meet again,
Don’t know where,don’t know when,
But I know we’ll meet again, some sunny day.”Vera Lynn (We’ll Meet Again)
- “Only in the agony of parting do we look into the depths of love.”
George Eliot
- “What is that feeling when you’re driving away from people and they recede on the plain till you see their specks dispersing? – it’s the too-huge world vaulting us, and it’s good-bye. But we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies.”
Jack Kerouac (On the Road)
- “Remember me and smile, for it’s better to forget than to remember me and cry.”
Dr. Suess
- “So long as the memory of certain beloved friends lives in my heart, I shall say that life is good.”
Helen Keller
- “Yesterday brought the beginning, tomorrow brings the end, though somewhere in the middle we became the best of friends.”
Unknown
- “Goodbyes make you think. They make you realize what you’ve had, what you’ve lost, and what you’ve taken for granted.”
Ritu Ghatourey
- “Moving on, is a simple thing, what it leaves behind is hard.”
Dave Mustaine
- “They must often change, who would be constant in happiness or wisdom.”
Confucius
- “The pain of parting is nothing to the joy of meeting again.”
Charles Dickens (Nicholas Nickleby)
- “Life is a journey, not a destination.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
- “Though miles may lie between us,
We are never far apart,
For friendship doesn’t count miles,
It’s measured by the heart.”Unknown - “To part is the lot of all mankind. The world is a scene of constant leave-taking, and the hands that grasp in cordial greeting today, are doomed ere long to unite for the the last time, when the quivering lips pronounce the word – Farewell.”
R.M. Ballantyne
- “Goodbyes are not forever,
Goodbyes are not the end.
They simply mean I’ll miss you,
Until we meet again.”Unknown