It is better to live rich, than to die rich.

The saying contrasts two kinds of “richness”: the lived experience of using one’s resources (money, time, opportunities) to improve one’s life and do good, versus merely accumulating wealth that remains unspent until death. Its moral thrust is anti-hoarding and implicitly pro-generosity: wealth has value chiefly when it is converted into lived well-being, relief of others’ needs, or meaningful activity. Read this way, “die rich” becomes a critique of miserliness and of confusing possession with enjoyment or purpose. Even without a verified Johnsonian context, the sentiment aligns with a common eighteenth-century ethical commonplace: prudence and charity should govern wealth, not mere accumulation.