The lines reported to have been written by Sir Walter Raleigh the night
before his execution were _not_, I think, those alluded to by AEGROTUS.
In the _Reliquiae Wottonianae_ are some few "poems found amongst the
papers of Sir Henry Wotton," one of which is headed "Sir Walter Raleigh
the Night before his Death," and is this:
"Even such is _time_ that takes on trust
Our _youth_, our _joyes_, our all we have,
And pays us but with _age_ 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."--W. R.
P. 396, 3d edition, London, 1672.
In the _Collection of Sacred Poetry_, edited for the Parker Society by
Mr. Farr (vol. i. p. 236.), the lines I have adduced are headed "An
Epitaph" and attributed to Sir W. Raleigh on the above melancholy
occasion.
"The Soul's Errand," which AEGROTUS quotes from, is entitled "The
Farewell" in the same collection; but so much ambiguity rests upon Sir
Walter's poetry that I shall merely add my conviction that the "Epitaph"
is only a fragment--"judicent peritiores."