"But how he set I know not.
There seemed a purple stile
Which little yellow boys and girls
Were climbing all the while,
"Till when they reached the other side,
A dominie in grey
Put gently up the evening bars,
And led the flock away."
"He preached upon 'breadth' till it argued him narrow—
The broad are too broad to define;
And of 'truth' until it proclaimed him a liar—
The truth never flaunted a sign.
Simplicity fled from his counterfeit presence
As gold the pyrites would shun.
What confusion would cover the innocent Jesus
To meet so enabled a man!"
The "so enabled a man" is a very characteristic Dickinsonian phrase. So, too, are these:
"He put the belt around my life—
I heard the buckle snap."
"Unfitted by an instant's grace
For the contented beggar's face
I wore an hour ago."
"Just his sigh, accented,
Had been legible to me."