hat passions, what hopes, what virtue
and vice, what loved and loving forms, what withered anatomies, have here
been laid down! Tread gently!--every bit of dust you tread on was once a
man and a brother. Tread reverently! for here human hearts bursting with
agony--the mother weeping for her children, the lover for his bride--have
seen the last of all they hoped for under the sun. You may hear a good
sermon here from the old text: 'Vanity of vanities,' saith the preacher,
'all is vanity.' Such is the lesson we learn here--that all the shows of
the world are poor and little worth--that false is

'--the light on glory's plume,
As fading hues of even.
And love, and hope, and beauty's bloom,
Are blossoms gather'd for the tomb--
There's nothing true but heaven!'

But we may not linger here. Time came and went, and, as usual, wrought
wonders. St. Pancras ceased to be St. Pancras in the fields. It was
laid out in broad streets and handsome squares. It was lit up with gas.
It echoed to the roll of carriages. It witnessed the introduction of
flunkies, with glaring livery and tremendous calf. Upon its broad
pavements flaunted, in all their bravery, city lords and city ladies. Of
course, the old church would not do for such as they. Early Christians
might worship God in a barn, but modern ones, rich and respectable--of
course, if they are rich they must be respectable--would not for the life
of them do anything so ungenteel. So a new place--the first stone of
which was laid by a Royal Duke, notorious for his debts and his connexion
with Mrs. Clarke,--was built, with a pulpit made out of the old
well-known Fairlop oak, on the model of a certain great heathen edifice,
and the St. Pancras new church reared its would-be aristocratic head.
Alas! alas! it was on the unfashionable side of Russell-square. That
difficulty was insurmountable, and so the church has to stand where it
does. However, the frequenters try to forget the unpleasant fact, and to
make themselves as genteel as they can.

Take your stand there at eleven on the Sabbath morning. What a glare of
silks and satins--of feathers--of jewels--of what cynics would call the
pomps and vanities of the world! With what an air does that delicate
young female--I beg her pardon, I mean young lady--foot it, with Jeames
behind carrying her Book of Common Prayer! United Belgravia could hardly
do the thing in better style. Enter the church, an