pense of others. "He is
superior to Cooper," said one; "he speaks better than Fennell," said a
second: these sagacious observations too, are rarely accompanied by a
modest qualification, such as "I think," or "it is my opinion"--but
nailed down with a peremptory IS. This is the mere naked offspring of a
muddy or unfinished mind, which, for want of discrimination to point
out the particular beauties it affects to admire, accomplishes its will
by a sweeping wholesale term of comparison, more injurious to him they
praise than to him they slight. Nay, so far has this been carried, that
some who never were out of the limits of this union have, by a kind of
telescopical discernment, viewed Cooke and Kemble in comparison with
their new favourite, and found them quite deficient. We cannot readily
forget one circumstance: a person said to another in our hearing at the
playhouse, "You have been in England, sir, don't you think Master Payne
superior to young Betty?" "I don't know, sir, having never seen Master
Betty," answered the man; "I think he is very much superior," replied
the former--"You have seen Master Betty then, sir," said the latter;
"No, I never did," returned he that asked the first question, "but I am
sure of it--I have heard a person that was in England say so!!"--This
was the pure effusion of a mind subdued to prostration by wonder. In
England this was carried to such lengths, that the panegyrists of young
Betty seemed to vie with each other in fanatical admiration of that
truly extraordinary boy. One, in a public print, went so far as to
assert, that Mr. Fox (who, as well as Mr. Pitt, was at young Betty's
benefit when he played Hamlet) declared the performance was little, if
at all, inferior to that of his deceased friend Garrick. With the very
same breath in which we read the paragraph we declared it to be a
falsehood. Mr. Fox had too much judgment to institute the
comparison--Mr. Fox had too much benignity to utter such a malicious
libel upon that noble boy.

These considerations naturally augmented our anxiety, and we did most
heartily wish, if it were possible, to be relieved from the task of
giving an opinion of Master Payne. For in addition to his youthfulness,
we knew that he wanted many advantages which young Betty possessed. The
infant Roscius of England, had, from his very infancy, been in a state
of the best discipline; being from the time he was five years of age,
daily exercised in recitation of poe