Has paid a soldier's debt: He only lived but till he was a man; But like a man he died.

Your son, my lord, has paid a soldier’s debt:
He only lived but till he was a man;
But like a man he died.

– William Shakespeare

Macbeth, Act 5, Scene 8. Ross delivers the news of Young Siward’s death to his father Siward. He lived long enough to become a man, he says, and died nobly as a man would die. A metaphor describes Young Siward is paying “a soldier’s debt.”

William Shakespeare Quotes