University of Virginia Library

Search this document 
Poems on Several Occasions

Written by Charles Cotton

expand section 
expand section 

Song.

I

Sad thoughts make hast and kill me out,
I live too long in pain;
'Tis dying to be still in doubt,
And death, that ends all miseries,
The chief and only favour is
The wretched can obtain.

47

II

I have liv'd long enough to know
That life is a Disease,
At least it does torment me so,
That Death, at whom the happy start,
I court to come, and with his Dart
To give me a release.

III

Come, friendly Death, then strike me dead,
For all this while I die,
And but long dying nothing dread;
Yet being with grief the one half slain,
With all thy power thou wilt gain
But half a Victory.