ON SPORTS AND EXERCISES. 211 



people had once acquired a taste for bloody exhibitions, 

 the detestable spectacle of gladiatorial combats was pre- 

 sented for their amusement. 



The progress of cruelty and the danger of gratifying 

 barbarous propensities, cannot admit of more striking 

 illustration than what is aflforded by. considering tha 

 effects of these savage exhibitions on the manners and 

 character of the Romans. 



This is not the proper place to discuss the question of 

 Right or Expedience/ y which man has always claimed of 

 rendering subservient to his wanton sports, the lives and 

 feeling? of the brute creation. It will come with mort 

 propriety under discussion in the sequel of these observa- 

 tions. — But it may not be improper, at present, to ani- ^ 

 madvert on the consequences of rendering bloody scenes 

 familiar and amusing to even an enlightened people. 



The frequent spectacle of animals* conflicting with Conflicts of 

 each other in the games of the Amphitheatre, gradually wild animals 

 hardened the public mind, and begat a necessity for diver- ^^ "ten- 

 sions of a more animated and dangerous kind. — Men 

 were encouraged, and even compelled to enter the lists 

 with wild beasts. At first, condemned criminals forfeited ^. ^j-gj. ctlml- 

 their lives in these contests. But these were not suf- nals,and after* 

 ficiently numerous to gratify the appetite of a degraded ^^^'^^.^^"|i 

 and licentious people. Men + were professedly instructed initructed, &c 

 and regularly hired to sell their blood, like gladiators, in 

 these bestial contests. Such enormities, great as they are, 

 hide their diminished heads before the supreme wicked- 

 ness and cruelty of gladiatorial exhibitions. When the 

 susceptibility to humane and tender feelings became al- 

 most extinct by the bestial encounters, it became neces- 



* In the shew of wild beasts exhibited by Julius Casar in his 

 third Consulship, twenty elephants were opposed to joo footmen, 

 and ao more with turrets on their backs (sixty men being allowed 

 to each turret) engaged with 600 foot and as many horse. There 

 were three sorts of these diversions, under the common title of Ve- 

 nation. The first, when the people were permitted to run after the 

 beasts and catch what they could for their own use— the second, 

 when the beasts fought with one another', and the third, when 

 they were brought out to engage with mea.— See Keanet's Romam 

 Antiquities. 



t These were caU^d Bestiarii. 



