he luxury of physical ease, have been wet by the life-blood from the
veins of the wounded gladiators.

Quinetiam exhilarare viris convivia caede
Mos olim, et miscere epulis spectacula dira
Certantum ferro, saepe et super ipsa cadentum
Pocula, _respersis non parco sanguine mensis_.

Time would fail us were we to illustrate the various horrors which
attended these amusements, designed to entertain the most refined
population of Rome. Time would fail us were we to enumerate the various
classifications in the art of murder on the stage, the signals which
were made by the multitude in token of relenting clemency, the more
usual signal, made by virgins and matrons, demanding the continuance of
the combat unto death. Do we not call Titus the delight of the human
race? Do we not praise his commonplace puerility, _perdidi diem_, the
exclamation of conceit, rather than of manliness? And yet it was this
philanthropist, this favourite of humanity, who caused the vast
amphitheatre to be erected, as it were a monument to all ages of the
barbarous civilization of the capital of his empire. And as to the
numbers who appeared on these occasions, do we suppose it was a pair? or
a score? We will not ask after the horrors commended and consummated by
a Tiberius or a Caligula. Was not Trajan a moderate prince? Was he not
disposed to introduce habits of a reasonable industry? Yet the active
Trajan kept up a succession of games to cheat the population of Rome of
ennui, during a hundred and twenty-three days, in which time ten
thousand gladiators were decked for sacrifice.

Thus the vehemence of this passion is evident from the atrocity of the
resources by which its cravings are satisfied. We may also remark, that
superstition itself, interwoven as it is with all the fears and
weaknesses of humanity, subjects the human mind to a bondage less severe
and less permanent than that of the terrific craving after something to
dissipate the weariness of the heart. At Rome the sacrifices to the
heathen deities were abolished before the games of the gladiators were
suppressed; it was less difficult to take from the priests their spoils,
from the altars their victims, from the prejudices of the people their
religious faith, than to rescue from ennui the miserable wretches whose
lives were to be the sport of the idle. The laws already forbade the
offering the bull to Jove, when the poet still had to pray that none
might perish in the ci