Coleridge's Opinion of Defoe

Wilson, in his *Memoirs of the life and Times of Defoe*, vol. ii. p. 205., having quoted the opinion of the Editor of Cadell's edition of *Robinson Crusoe*,—"that Defoe wanted many of those qualities, both of mind and manner, which fitted Steele and Addison to be the inimitable *arbitri elegantiarum* of English society, there can be no doubt," —Coleridge wrote in the margin of his copy, "I doubt this, particularly in respect to Addison, and think I could select from Defoe's writings a volume equal in size to Addison's collected papers, little inferior in wit and humour, and greatly superior in…