A rectangular decorative headpiece composed of three horizontal rows of ornate floral and foliate woodcut patterns.

To that Most Eminent Man

Thomas Bodley, Knight

of the Golden Spur, the Magnificent

Builder of the Oxford

Library.

Holy Soul! and greetings likewise to your holy ashes!
And let it be permitted to remember your dust once and for all!
Arranger of Heaven, and a fuller Order of the Stars,
Who, through your own work, does not allow the stars to be scattered.
For indeed, you provide a home Lares: the Roman household gods, here used to mean a permanent sanctuary or domestic hearth for books that were wandering as they ought,
And you are celebrated as the Heaven in which the constellations are fixed.
We, as fathers, bestow life upon our offspring: but you
Alone possess the power by which they might truly live this life.
The Arts recognize this shelter: Here every discipline enters
After the hands of the midwives The "midwives" likely refer to the authors, printers, and scholars who bring books into being; Bodley provides the "home" where they can survive after birth., no longer a stranger.
A stage for the gown original: "Scæna Togæ" — a reference to the "toga" or academic dress, representing the scholarly and civic life of the university., and an assembly Panegyris: a formal public festival or grand gathering of people from across the world capable of holding the learned world,
A Sea, or rather, a wave fuller than the Sea itself.