Volume 5 — A Song. Set by Mr. Fishburne.
Reading edition
[Listen]
WHy am I the only Creature, Must a ruin’d Love pursue; Other Passions yield to Nature, Mine there’s nothing can subdue: Not the Glory of Possessing, Monarch wishes gave me ease, More and more the mighty Blessings Did my raging Pains encrease. Nor could Jealousie relieve me, Tho’ it ever waited near; Cloath’d in gawdy Pow’r to grieve me, Still the Monster would appear: That, nor Time, nor Absence neither, Nor Despair removes my Pain; I endure them all together, Yet my Torments still remain. Had alone her matchless beauty, Set my amorous Heart on Fire, Age at last would do its Duty, Fuel ceasing, Flames expire. But her Mind immortal grows, Makes my Love immortal too; Nature ne’er created Faces, Can the Charms of Souls undoe. And to make my Loss the greater, She laments it as her own; Could she scorn me, I might hate her, But alas! she shews me none: Then since Fortune is my Ruin, In Retirement I’ll Complain; And in rage for my undoing, Ne’er come in its Power again.
