Too much is expected from
precocity, and too little performed. Miss ---- was an instance of
early cultivation, but in what did it terminate? In marrying a little
Presbyterian parson, who keeps an infant boarding-school, so that all
her employment now is,
"To suckle fools, and chronicle small-beer."
She tells the children, "This is a cat, and that is a dog, with four
legs and a tail; see there! you are much better than a cat or a dog, for
you can speak." If I had bestowed such an education on a daughter, and
had discovered that she thought of marrying such a fellow, I would have
sent her to the Congress.'
'After having talked slightingly of musick, he was observed to listen
very attentively while Miss Thrale played on the harpsichord, and with
eagerness he called to her, "Why don't you dash away like Burney?" Dr.
Burney upon this said to him, "I believe, Sir, we shall make a musician
of you at last." Johnson with candid complacency replied, "Sir, I shall
be glad to have a new sense given to me.
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