brushers

Updated: June 20, 2025

However, the question whether we are or, worse still, seem mere mediocrities does not greatly trouble most of us poor "brushers of noblemen's clothes"; by-the-by the expression quoted by Bacon might serve as an argument in a certain great controversy, if it be assumed that it was applied to the dramatic critics of his day. Yet unmerited praise on the whole does more harm than undeserved blame.

Edward Fordham Spence - Our Stage and Its Critics : By "E.F.S." of "The Westminster Gazette"