An Invitation to the Oxford Pageant, July 1907

Fair lady of learning, playfellow of spring,Who to thy towery hospice in the valeInvitest all, with queenly claim to bringScholars from every land within thy pale;If aught our pageantry may now availTo paint thine antique story to the eye,Inspire the scene, and bid thy herald cryWelcome to all, and to all comers hail!

Come hither, then he crieth, and hail to all.Bow each his heart a pilgrim at her shrine,Whatever chance hath led you to my call,Ye that love pomp, and ye that seek a sign,Or on the low earth look for things divine;Nor ye, whom reverend Camus near-allied,Writes in the roll of his ennobled pride,Refrain your praise and love to mix with mine.

Praise her, the mother of celestial moods,Who o'er the saints' inviolate arrayHath starr'd her robe of fair beatitudesWith jewels worn by Hellas, on the dayShe grew from girlhood into wisdom gay;And hath laid by her crozier, evermoreWith both hands gathering to enrich her store,And make her courts with music ring alway.

Love her, for that the world is in her heart,Man's rude antiquity and doubtful goal,The heaven-enthralling luxury of art,The burden'd pleading of his clay-bound soul,The mutual office of delight and dole,The merry laugh of youth, the joy of lifeOlder than thought, and the unamending strife'Twixt liberty and politic control.

There is none holier, not the lilied townBy Arno, whither the spirit of Athens fled,Escap't from Hades to a less renown,Yet joyful to be risen from the dead;Nor she whose wide imperious arms were spreadTo spoil mankind, until the avenger cameIn darkening storm, and left a ruin'd name,A triple crown, upon a vanquish't head.

What love in myriad hearts in every climeThe vision of her beauty calls to pray'r:Where at his feet Himâlaya sublimeHolds up aslope the Arabian floods, or wherePatriarchal Nile rears at his watery stair;In the broad islands of the Antipodes,By Esperanza, or in the coral seasWhere Buddha's vain pagodas throng the air;

Or where the chivalry of Nipon smoteThe wily Muscovite, intent to creepAround the world with half his pride afloat,And sent his battle to the soundless deep;Or with our pilgrim-kin, and them that reapThe prairie-corn beyond cold LabradorTo California and the Alaskan shore,Her exiled sons their pious memory keep:

Bright memories of young poetic pleasureIn free companionship, the loving stressOf all life-beauty lull'd in studious leisure,When every Muse was jocund with excessOf fine delight and tremulous happiness;The breath of an indolent unbridled June,When delicate thought fell from the dreamy moon:But now strange care, sorrow, and grief oppress.

'Ah! fewer tears shall be,--'tis thus they dream,--Ah, fewer, softer tears, when we lie low:On younger brows shall brighter laurel gleam:Lovelier and earlier shall the rosebuds blow.'For in this hope she nurs'd them, and to knowThat Truth, while men regard a tetter'd page,Leaps on the mountains, and from age to ageReveals the dayspring's inexhausted glow.

Yet all their joy is mingled with regret:As the lone scholar on a neighbouring height,Brooding disconsolate with eyelids wetEre o'er the unkind world he took his flight,Look'd down upon her festal lamps at night,And while the far call of her warning bellReach't to his heart, sang us his fond farewell,Beneath the stars thinking of lost delight;

'Farewell! for whether we be young or old,Thou dost remain, but we shall pass away:Time shall against himself thy house uphold,And build thy sanctuary from decay;Children unborn shall be thy pride and stay.May Earth protect thee, and thy sons be true;And God with heavenly food thy life renew,Thy pleasure and thy grace from day to day.'