WHEN We reflect with what glory and for how many ages the name of Sappho has been transmitted, and that it has adorned even the present one, we cannot too much regret the ravage time has committed on the poetry of this illustrious woman, of which there now remains but a few fragments. She must have possessed, in a high degree, the esteem of the Grecians, who named her their tenth muse. The celebrated writers of antiquity always mention her with a kind of transport. Even Longinus, this impartial and severe critic, hesitated not to propose her as the most perfect model of her kind, and we may easily conceive in what species of writing she excelled. Endowed with a most feeling and ardent soul, she obeyed the dictates of nature. Tenderness, and the transports of love, she painted in glowing, but natural colours, for she felt their influence; but envy that "worst of poisons, which ever finds a ready entrance to ignoble minds," persecuted her with violence: she was abandoned, betrayed, and unhappy.