As a describer of life and manners, he must be allowed to stand
perhaps the first of the first rank. His humour, which, as Steele
observes, is peculiar to himself, is so happily diffused as to give
the grace of novelty to domestic scenes and daily occurrences. He
never "o'ersteps the modesty of nature," nor raises merriment or
wonder by the violation of truth. His figures neither divert by
distortion nor amaze by aggravation. He copies life with so much
fidelity that he can be hardly said to invent; yet his exhibitions
have an air so much original, that it is difficult to suppose them
not merely the product of imagination.

As a teacher of wisdom, he may be confidently followed. His
religion has nothing in it enthusiastic or superstitious: he
appears neither weakly credulous nor wantonly sceptical; his
morality is neither dangerously lax nor impracticably rigid. All
the enchantment of fancy, and all the cogency of argument, are
employed to recommend to the reader his real interest, the care of
pleasing the Author of his being. Truth is shown sometimes as the
phantom of a vision; sometimes appears half-veiled in an allegory;
sometimes attracts regard in the robes of fancy; and sometimes steps
forth in the confidence of reason. She wears a thousand dresses,
and in all is pleasing.

"Mille habet ornatus, mille decenter habet."

His prose is the model of the middle style; on grave subjects not
formal, on light occasions not grovelling; pure without
scrupulosity, and exact without apparent elaboration; always
equable, and always easy, without glowing words or pointed
sentences. Addison never deviates from his track to snatch a grace;