Ode Sung At The Opening Of The International Exhibition

by Alfred Lord Tennyson

I.

Uplift a thousand voices full and sweet,
In this wide hall with earth’s invention stored,
And praise the invisible universal Lord,
Who lets once more in peace the nations meet,
Where Science, Art, and Labor have outpour’d
Their myriad horns of plenty at our feet.

 

II.

O silent father of our Kings to be,
Mourn’d in this golden hour of jubilee,
For this, for all, we weep our thanks to thee!

 

III.

The world-compelling plan was thine,–
And, lo! the long laborious miles
Of Palace; lo! the giant aisles,
Rich in model and design;
Harvest-tool and husbandry,
Loom and wheel and enginery,
Secrets of the sullen mine,
Steel and gold, and corn and wine,
Fabric rough, or fairy-fine,
Sunny tokens of the Line,
Polar marvels, and a feast
Of wonder, out of West and East,
And shapes and hues of Art divine!
All of beauty, all of use,
That one fair planet can produce,
Brought from under every star,
Blown from over every main,
And mixt, as life is mixt with pain,
The works of peace with works of war.

 

IV.

Is the goal so far away?
Far, how far no tongue can say,
Let us dream our dream to-day.

 
V.

O ye, the wise who think, the wise who reign,
From growing Commerce loose her latest chain,
And let the fair white-wing’d peacemaker fly
To happy havens under all the sky,
And mix the seasons and the golden hours;
Till each man find his own in all men’s good,
And all men work in noble brotherhood,
Breaking their mailed fleets and armed towers,
And ruling by obeying Nature’s powers,
And gathering all the fruits of earth and crown’d

with all her flowers.