"Lordynges," quod he, "in chirches whan I preche,
I peyne me to han an hauteyn speche,
And rynge it out as round as gooth a belle,
For I kan al by rote that I telle."
– Geoffrey Chaucer
The Canterbury Tales, The Pardoner’s Prologue. When the Pardoner preaches in church he speaks out in a loud and impressive voice and knows it all by rote, he tells the pilgrims with a touch of arrogance. So he doesn’t preach from the heart, but his preaching is rhetorical, and his focus is on style and delivery over substance and sincerity. He is a performer. A metaphor decribes how the Pardoner rings his sermon out as round as goes a bell.