Chaucer wrote his tales of the pilgrimage a thousand years ago.
Even in the prologue the reader can identify when Chaucer is building a character up and when he is going to use comedy to tear it down. Justice Antonin Scalia approaches his opinions in a similar way. Scalia uses comedic or satirical phrases to ridicule an argument. However, similarly Chaucer would say something almost nice and then end the line with a tongue and cheek comeback. This is displayed in the prologue when Chaucer compares the knight to his son, the squire. When Chaucer makes subtle comments about the knights horses but also his dirty clothes, or the squires pressed hair, he brings subtle digs at sexuality and wealth without being overly offensive.
Chaucer set the precedent for a justifiably nice sentence, with maybe two words that seem nice but their tone changes the meaning being deemed okay. Scalia follows this guideline in his opinions, he will write a seemingly nice or well composed paragraph with a random line that edges on randomly inappropriate, but as a whole brings a comedic aspect to the long article.
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