Empire Day

I. With voice and solemn music sing,

Loud let the pealing trumpets ring!

To-day our hands consolidate

The Empire of a thousand years,

Delusive hopes, distracting fears,

Have passed and left her great.

For Britain, Britain, we our voices raise,

Uplift your voices all, worthy is she of praise!

II. Our England at the call of Fate

Left her lone islets in the sea.

Donned her Imperial robe and state,

Took the sole sceptre of the Free!

'Mid clang of arms her Empire rose,

Embattled rolls her story down,

By shattered fleet, and flaming town,

Victorious over all her foes,

Soldier and sailor side by side,

Her strong sons bravely dared and died!

Close on their steps her dauntless toilers went,

O'er unknown sea and pathless continent,

And left, when years of strife were done

The proudest realm beneath the sun.

Praise them and Her, your grateful voices raise,

Mother of Freedom! worthy art thou of praise!

III. No more we seek our realm's increase

By savage war, but white-winged peace,

To-day we seek to bind in one,

Till all our England's work be done.

Through wider knowledge closer grown,

As each fair sister by the rest is known,

And mutual Commerce, mighty to efface

The envious bars of Time and Place,

Our great world Empire's ev'ry part,

And through a common speech expressed――

From North to South, from East to West,

Deep pulsing from a common heart,

An universal Britain strong

To 'stablish right and beat down wrong!

Let this thing be - who shall our realm divide?

We stand, to sink or triumph side by side!

IV. To-day we would make free

The millions of their glorious heritage.

Here, Labour crowds in hopeless misery;

There, is unbounded work and ready wage.

The salt breeze calling, stirs our Northern blood,

Lead we the toilers to their certain goal;

Guide we their feet to where

Is spread, for those who dare,

A happier Britain ’neath an ampler air.

V. First lady of our English race,

'Tis well that with thy Jubilee,

This glorious dream begins to be:

This thy lost consort would, this would thy son,

Who had seen all thine Empire face to face,

And fain would leave it one.

Oh, may the Hand which rules our Fate,

Keep this our Britain great!

We cannot tell, we can but pray

Heaven's blessing on our work today.

Rise palace fair, where all may see

This proud embodied unity,

For Britain and Queen one voice we raise,

Laud them, rejoice, peal forth,

worthy are they of praise!

Whitsun

And let us do it with no show of fear;
No, with no more than if we heard that England
Were busied with a Whitsun morris-dance

All down the line

Fresh couples climbed aboard: the rest stood round;

The last confetti and advice were thrown,

And, as we moved, each face seemed to define   

Just what it saw departing: children frowned   

At something dull; fathers had never known

Success so huge and wholly farcical;

    The women shared

The secret like a happy funeral;

While girls, gripping their handbags tighter, stared   

At a religious wounding. 

Yo have you *seen* England rn? pic.twitter.com/8M5CX8F7z7

— Ancient Earthling (@Dust_Foot) May 12, 2024

Coronation Day

O singular happiness of St John to have stood under the Cross of Christ, so near His divine person, when the other disciples had all forsaken Him! O extraordinary privilege, to have suffered Martyrdom in the person of Jesus and been eye-witness of all He did or endured and of all that happened to Him, in that great sacrifice and mystery. Here he drank of his cup; this was truly a Martyrdom and our Saviour exempted all those who had assisted at the Martyrdom of His Cross, from suffering death by the hands of persecutors. St John, nevertheless, received also the crown of this second Martyrdom, to which the sacrifice of his will, was not wanting but only the execution.

[Tertullian, quoted in Guéranger]

Quia si quis auditor est verbi et non factor, hic conparabitur viro consideranti vultum nativitatis suae in speculo. Consideravit enim se et abiit et statim oblitus est qualis fuerit.

May Day