Lyra Frivola — A Reader’s Guide

Man was born to suffer here: Christmas comes but once a year.

When Autumn's winds denude the grove, I seek my Lecture, where it lurks 'Mid the unpublished portion of My works,

And ponder, while its sheets I scan, How many years away have slipt Since first I penned that ancient man- uscript.

I know thee well--nor can mistake The old accustomed pencil stroke Denoting where I mostly make A joke,--

Or where coy brackets signify Those echoes faint of classic wit Which, if a lady's present, I Omit.

Though Truth enlarge her widening range, And Knowledge be with time increased, While thou, my Lecture! dost not change The least,

But fixed immutable amidst The advent of a newer lore, Maintainest calmly what thou didst Before:

Though still malignity avows That unsuccessful candidates To thee ascribe their frequent ploughs In Greats--

Once more for intellectual food Thou'lt serve: an added phrase or two Will make thee really just as good As new:

And listening crowds, that throng the spot, Will still as usual complain That "Here's the old familiar rot Again!"

RUBÁIYYÁT OF MODERATIONS

Wake! for the Nightingale upon the Bough Has sung of Moderations: ay, and now Pales in the Firmament above the Schools The Constellation of the boding Plough.

I too in distant Ages long ago To him that ploughed me gave a Quid or so: It was a Fraud: it was not good enough; Ne'er for my Quid had I my Quid pro Quo.

Yet--for the Man who pays his painful Pence Some Laws may frame from dark Experience: Still from the Wells of harsh Adversity May Wisdom draw the Pail of Common Sense--

Take these few Rules, which--carefully rehearsed-- Will land the User safely in a First, Second, or Third, or Gulf: and after all There's nothing lower than a Plough at worst.

Plain is the Trick of doing Latin Prose, An Esse Videantur at the Close Makes it to all Intents and Purposes As good as anything of Cicero's.

Yet let it not your anxious Mind perturb Should Grammar's Law your Diction fail to curb: Be comforted: it is like Tacitus: Tis mostly done by leaving out the Verb.

Mark well the Point: and thus your Answer fit That you thereto all Reference omit, But argue still about it and about Of This, and That, and T'Other--not of It.

Say, why should You upon your proper Hook Dilate on Things which whoso cares to look Will find, in Libraries or otherwhere, Already stated in a printed Book?

Keep clear of Facts: the Fool who deals in those A Mucker he inevitably goes: The dusty Don who looks your Paper o'er He knows about it all--or thinks he knows.

A Pipe, a Teapot, and a Pencil blue, A Crib, perchance a Lexicon--and You Beside him singing in a Wilderness Of Suppositions palpably untrue--

'Tis all he needs: he is content with these: Not Facts he wants, but soft Hypotheses Which none need take the Pains to verify: This is the Way that Men obtain Degrees!

'Twixt Right and Wrong the Difference is dim: 'Tis settled by the Moderator's Whim: Perchance the Delta on your Paper marked Means that his Lunch has disagreed with him:

Perchance the Issue lies in Fortune's Lap: For if the Names be shaken in a Cap (As some aver) then Truth and Fallacy No longer signify a single Rap.

Nay! till the Hour for pouring out the Cup Of Tea post-prandial calls you home to sup, And from the dark Invigilator's Chair The mild Muezzin whispers "Time is Up"--

The Moving Finger writes: then, having writ, The Product of your Scholarship and Wit Deposit in the proper Pigeonhole-- And thank your Stars that there's an End of it!

LINES TO AN OLD FRIEND

When we're daily called to arms by continual alarms, And the journalist unceasingly dilates On the agitating fact that we're soon to be attacked By the Germans, or the Russians, or the States: When the papers all are swelling with a patriotic rage, And are hurling a defiance or a threat, Then I cool my martial ardour with the pacifying page Of the _Oxford University Gazette_.

When I hanker for a statement that is practical and dry (Being sated with sensation in excess, With the vespertinal rumour and the matutinal lie Which adorn the lucubrations of the Press), Then I turn me to the columns where there's nothing to attract, Or the interest to waken and to whet, And I revel in a banquet of unmitigated fact In the _Oxford University Gazette_.