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This page contrasts the careful motion of monks with the impossibility of priests, ending in the image of tongues gone bad.

The poem works by moral contrast. The restraint in 'not stepping on the early squash' makes the final line about priests and bad tongues feel sharper, as though speech and institution have failed where humble movement still carries integrity.

Two clerical figures are weighed against each other: monks who keep from 'stepping on the early squash' embody a careful tending, while 'The impossibility of priests / Loaded with bad tongues' marks the failure. The page sets bodily restraint against corrupt speech, locating virtue in what the feet avoid rather than what the mouth proclaims.