_BY A WEARY SECULAR SCRIBE._
Oh, to be a Pulpiteer!
Purists may fie-fie, or sneer.
But, when wit and fancy fail,
To produce your twice-cooked kail
(As "a traveller") must be nice.
Nor are you confined to _twice_;
Hashed, rehashed, and hashed again,
Garnished--from another brain,
Seasoned--from another cruet,
You may roast, or boil, or stew it
O'er and o'er, year in year out,
As you perorate about,
Seek, when weary,--o'ertasked elves!
"Inspiration" from your shelves.
Salt it here, and sauce it there,
Saying nothing, since none care
To make question, taking pay,
Yes, and praise upon your way,
For--well, ere the thing is through,
What is what and who is who,
It might puzzle you to tell;
Still you "think it right"! Ah, well!
This philosophy peripatetic
Strikes a chord that's sympathetic
In the breast of secular scribe;
Nothing, it is true, would bribe
Him to play the pious prig,
But--he heaves a sigh that's big
Murmuring, enviously I fear,--
Oh, to be a Pulpiteer!
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