I know how little the words of an outsider mean to you just now—but I must tell you how deeply I sympathize with you in your great loss.
Note or Telegram to a Friend
All my sympathy and all my thoughts are with you in your great sorrow. If I can be of any service to you, you know how grateful I shall be.
Telegram to a Very Near Relative or Friend
Words are so empty! If only I knew how to fill them with love and send them to you.
Or:
If love and thoughts could only help you, Margaret dear, you should have all the strength of both that I can give.
Letter Where Death Was Release
The letter to one whose loss is "for the best" is difficult in that you want to express sympathy but can not feel sad that one who has long suffered has found release. The expression of sympathy in this case should not be for the present death, but for the illness, or whatever it was that fell long ago. The grief for a paralysed mother is for the stroke which cut her down many years before, and your sympathy, though you may not have realized it, is for that. You might write:
Your sorrow during all these years—and now—is in my heart; and all my thoughts and sympathy are with you.