Nor did the Pulpit’s oratory fail
  To achieve its higher triumph.  Not unfelt 545
  Were its admonishments, nor lightly heard
  The awful truths delivered thence by tongues
  Endowed with various power to search the soul;
  Yet ostentation, domineering, oft
  Poured forth harangues, how sadly out of place!—­550
  There have I seen a comely bachelor,
  Fresh from a toilette of two hours, ascend
  His rostrum, with seraphic glance look up,
  And, in a tone elaborately low
  Beginning, lead his voice through many a maze 555
  A minuet course; and, winding up his mouth,
  From time to time, into an orifice
  Most delicate, a lurking eyelet, small,
  And only not invisible, again
  Open it out, diffusing thence a smile 560
  Of rapt irradiation, exquisite. 
  Meanwhile the Evangelists, Isaiah, Job,
  Moses, and he who penned, the other day,
  The Death of Abel, [Z] Shakespeare, and the Bard
  Whose genius spangled o’er a gloomy theme 565
  With fancies thick as his inspiring stars, [a]
  And Ossian (doubt not, ’tis the naked truth)
  Summoned from streamy Morven [b]—­each and all
  Would, in their turns, lend ornaments and flowers
  To entwine the crook of eloquence that helped 570
  This pretty Shepherd, pride of all the plains,
  To rule and guide his captivated flock.

  I glance but at a few conspicuous marks,
  Leaving a thousand others, that, in hall,
  Court, theatre, conventicle, or shop, 575
  In public room or private, park or street,
  Each fondly reared on his own pedestal,
  Looked out for admiration.  Folly, vice,
  Extravagance in gesture, mien, and dress,
  And all the strife of singularity, 580
  Lies to the ear, and lies to every sense—­
  Of these, and of the living shapes they wear,
  There is no end.  Such candidates for regard,
  Although well pleased to be where they were found,
  I did not hunt after, nor greatly prize, 585
  Nor made unto myself a secret boast
  Of reading them with quick and curious eye;
  But, as a common produce, things that are
  To-day, to-morrow will be, took of them
  Such willing note, as, on some errand bound 590
  That asks not speed, a Traveller might bestow
  On sea-shells that bestrew the sandy beach,
  Or daisies swarming through the fields of June.

    But foolishness and madness in parade,
  Though most at home in this their dear domain, 595
  Are scattered everywhere, no rarities,
  Even to the rudest novice of the Schools. 
  Me, rather, it employed, to note, and keep
  In memory, those individual sights