T. R. Smith, comp. Poetica Erotica: Rare and Curious Amatory Verse. 1921–22.
To Little or No Purpose Have I Spent All My Days
By Sir George Etherege (1635?–1691)(A Song in She Would If She Could) TO little or no purpose have I spent all my days | |
| In ranging the Park, th’ Exchange, and the Plays, | |
| Yet ne’er in my Rambles till now did I prove | |
| So happy, to meet with the man I could love. | |
| But, O how I’m pleased when I think of the man | 5 |
| That I find I must love, let me do what I can! | |
| How long I shall love him, I can no more tell, | |
| Than had I a Fever, when I should be well: | |
| My Passion shall kill me before I will show it, | |
| And yet I would give all the world he did know it: | 10 |
| But, O how I sigh, when I think, should he woo me, | |
| That I cannot deny what I know will undo me! | |