itics vary greatly, and the following summary
must be taken not as a positive judgment but only as an attempt to express
the general impression of his works on an uncritical reader. He is first of
a realist, who paints life as he sees it. As he says himself, "I have no
brains above my eyes; I describe what I see.". His pictures of certain
types, notably the weak and vicious elements of society, are accurate and
true to life, but they seem to play too large a part in his books, and have
perhaps too greatly influenced his general judgment of humanity. An
excessive sensibility, or the capacity for fine feelings and emotions, is a
marked characteristic of Thackeray, as it is of Dickens and Carlyle. He is
easily offended, as they are, by the shams of society; but he cannot find
an outlet, as Dickens does, in laughter and tears, and he is too gentle to
follow Carlyle in violent denunciations and prophecies. He turns to
satire,--influenced, doubtless, by eighteenth-century literature which he
knew so well, and in which satire played too large a part.[241] His satire
is never personal, like Pope's, or brutal, like Swift's, and is tempered by
kindness and humor; but it is used too freely, and generally lays too much
emphasis on faults and foibles to be considered a true picture of any large
class of English society.

Besides being a realist and satirist, Thackeray is essentially a moralist,
like Addison, aiming definitely in all his work at producing a moral
impression. So much does he revere goodness, and so determined is he that
his Pendennis or his Becky Sharp shall be judged at their true value, that
he is not content, like Shakespeare, to be simply an artist, to tell an
artistic tale and let it speak its own message; he must explain and
emphasize the moral significance of his work. There is no need to consult
our own conscience over the actions of Thackeray's characters; the beauty
of virtue and the ugliness of vice are evident on every page.

Whatever we may think of Thackeray's matter, there is one point in which
critics are agreed,--that he is master of a pure and simple English style.
Whether his thought be sad or humorous, commonplace or profound, he
expresses it perfectly, without effort or affectation. In all his work
there is a subtle charm, impossible to describe, which gives the impression
that we are listening to a gentleman. And it is the ease, the refinement,
the exquisite naturalness of Thackeray's style that f