Commemoration may be, as John Richard Green said, 'Oxford in masquerade'; there may be 'grand incongruities, Abyssinian heroes robed in literary scarlet, degrees conferred by the suffrages of virgins in pink bonnets and blue, a great academical ceremony drowned in an atmosphere of Aristophanean (sic) chaff'. But the chaff is the legitimate successor of the burlesque performance of the Terrae Filius at the old 'Act', and the degrees are submitted to the House with the old formula; even the presence of ladies would have been no surprise to our predecessors of 200 years ago, however much they would have astonished our mediaeval founders and benefactors; in the Sheldonian from the first the gallery under the organ was always set apart for 'ladies and gentlewomen'. 'Oxford', to quote J.R. Green once again, 'is simply young', but when he goes on to say 'she is neither historic nor theological nor academical', he exaggerates; the charm of Oxford lies in the fact that her youth is at home among survivals historic, theological, and academical; and the old survives while the new flourishes.
FOOTNOTES:
[7] The form is found in the two 'Proctors' books', of which the oldest, that of the Junior Proctor, was drawn up (in 1407) by Richard Fleming, afterwards Bishop of Lincoln and founder of Lincoln College; but it was then already an established form, and probably goes back to the thirteenth century, i.e. to the reign of Henry III.
[8] It is perhaps still necessary to emphasize the fact that the name 'University' had nothing to do with the range of subjects taught, or with the fact that instruction was offered to all students; the latter point is expressed in the earlier name 'studium generale' borne by universities, which is not completely superseded by 'universitas' till the fifteenth century.
[9] The coincidence is not accidental. Magna Carta was wrested from a king humiliated by his submission to the Pope, and the University Charter was given to redress an act of violence on the part of the Oxford citizens, who had been stimulated in their attack on the 'clerks' of Oxford by John's quarrel with the Pope.
[10] Oxford never received this Papal ratification; but as its claim to be a 'studium generale' was indisputable, it, like Padua, was recognized as a 'general seat of study' 'by custom'. The University of Paris, however, at one time refused to admit Oxford graduates to teach without re-examination, and Oxford retorted (the Papal bull in favour of Paris notwithstanding) by refusing to recognize the rights of the Paris doctors to teach in her Schools.
[11] In the Scotch Universities Doctors are still created by 'birettatio', the laying on of the cap, and I believe this is still done at many 'Commencements' in America.
[12] Compare St. John x. 22, ἐγκαίνια = 'The Feast of the Dedication'.