Once a week the hero partook of food.  Many times a day he bowed his head to his feet; one man counted twelve hundred and forty-four times and then stopped in sheer weariness from gazing at the miracle of endurance aloft.  Again, from the setting of the sun to its appearance in the East, he would stand unsoothed by sleep with his arms outstretched like a cross.

If genius can understand such a life as that and fancy the thoughts of such a soul, Tennyson seems not only to have comprehended the consciousness of the Pillar Saint, but also to have succeeded in giving expression to his insight.  He has laid bare the soul of Simeon in its commingling of spiritual pride with affected humility, and of a consciousness of meritorious sacrifice with a sense of sin.  The Saint spurns notoriety and the homage of men, yet exults in his control over the multitudes.

The poet thus imagines Simeon to speak as the Saint is praying God to take away his sin: 

     “But yet
     Bethink thee, Lord, while thou and all the saints
     Enjoy themselves in heaven, and men on earth
     House in the shade of comfortable roofs,
     Sit with their wives by fires, eat wholesome food,
     And wear warm clothes, and even beasts have stalls,
     I, ’tween the spring and downfall of the light,
     Bow down one thousand and two hundred times,
     To Christ, the Virgin Mother, and the Saints;
     Or in the night, after a little sleep,
     I wake:  the chill stars sparkle; I am wet
     With drenching dews, or stiff with crackling frost. 
     I wear an undress’d goatskin on my back;
     A grazing iron collar grinds my neck;
     And in my weak, lean arms I lift the cross,
     And strive and wrestle with thee till I die: 
     O mercy, mercy! wash away my sin.

     O Lord, thou knowest what a man I am;
     A sinful man, conceived and born in sin: 
     ’Tis their own doing; this is none of mine;
     Lay it not to me.  Am I to blame for this,
     That here come those that worship me?  Ha! ha! 
     They think that I am somewhat.  What am I? 
     The silly people take me for a saint,
     And bring me offerings of fruit and flowers: 
     And I, in truth (thou wilt bear witness here)
     Have all in all endured as much, and more
     Than many just and holy men, whose names
     Are register’d and calendared for saints.

     Good people, you do ill to kneel to me. 
     What is it I can have done to merit this?

* * * * *

     Yet do not rise; for you may look on me,
     And in your looking you may kneel to God. 
     Speak! is there any of you halt or maim’d? 
     I think you know I have some power with Heaven
     From my long penance:  let him speak his wish.