Sir Walter Raleigh
Sir Walter Raleigh or Ralegh (c.1552 - 1618), was a famed English writer, poet, soldier, courtier, and explorer.
Raleigh was born to a Protestant family in Devon, the son of Walter Raleigh and Catherine Champernowne. Little is known for certain of his early life, though he spent some time in Ireland, in Killua Castle, Clonmellon, County Westmeath, taking part in the suppression of rebellions and participating in two infamous massacres at Rathlin Island and Smerwick, later becoming a landlord of lands confiscated from the Irish. He rose rapidly in Queen Elizabeth I's favour, being knighted in 1585, and was involved in the early English colonisation of the New World in Virginia under a royal patent. In 1591 he secretly married Elizabeth Throckmorton, one of the Queen's ladies-in-waiting, without requesting the Queen's permission, for which he and his wife were sent to the Tower of London. After his release, they retired to his estate at Sherborne, Dorset.
In 1594 Raleigh heard of a "City of Gold" in South America and sailed to find it, publishing an exaggerated account of his experiences in a book that contributed to the legend of El Dorado. After Queen Elizabeth died in 1603, Raleigh was again imprisoned in the Tower, this time for allegedly being involved in the Main Plot against King James I, who was not favourably disposed toward him. In 1616, however, he was released in order to conduct a second expedition in search of El Dorado. This was unsuccessful and the Spanish outpost at San Thomé was ransacked by men under his command. After his return to England he was arrested and, after a show trial held mainly to appease the Spanish after Raleigh's attack of San Thomé, he was beheaded at Whitehall.
“Even such is Time *Even such is Time, that takes in trustOur youth, our joys, our all we have,And pays us but with earth and dust;Who in the dark and silent grave,When we have wandered all our ways,Shuts up the story of our days:But from this earth, this grave, this dust,My God shall raise me up, I trust. Sir Walter Raleigh (1554-1618)*These lines are said to have been composed by Sir Walter Raleigh on the night before his execution.”
“When the grand twelve million jury of our sins and sinful fury, 'Gainst our souls black verdicts give, Christ pleads his death, and then we live. Be thou my speaker, taintless pleader, unblotted lawyer, true proceeder.”
“Our taste must always be, more or less, the victim of our limitations, but we should beware of glorying in it, and, above all, we should beware of mistaking the aversions of timidity and sensibility for critical judgments.”
“The world itself is but a large prison, out of which some are daily led to execution.”
“But Love is a durable firein the mind ever burningNever sick, never old, never deadFrom itself, never turning.”
“Fain would I climb, yet fear I to fall.”
“Thou mayest be sure that he that will in private tell thee of thy faults is thy friend, for he adventures thy dislike and hazards thy hatred; for there are few men that can endure it, every man for the most part delighting in self-praise, which is one of the most universal fallies that bewitcheth mankind”