The Romans had their _morning_ and their _meridian spectacles_. In the _former_, they had their combats of _men_ with _wild beasts_; and in the _latter_, the _men_ fought _one with another_. “I went,” says our author, “the other day to the _meridian spectacles_, in hope of meeting somewhat of mirth and diversion to sweeten the humors of those that had been entertained with blood in the _morning_; but it proved otherwise, for, compared with this inhumanity, the former was a mercy. The whole business was only murder upon murder: the combatants fought naked, and every blow was a wound. They do not contend for _victory_, but for _death_; and he that kills one man is to be killed by another. By wounds they are forced upon wounds which they take and give upon their bare _breasts. Burn that rogue_, they cry _What! Is he afraid of his flesh? Do but see how sneakingly that rascal dies._ Look to yourselves, my masters, and consider of it: who knows but this may come to be your own case?” Wicked examples seldom fail of coming home at last to the authors. To destroy a _single_ man may be dangerous; but to murder whole nations is only a more _glorious wickedness. Private avarice_ and _rigor_ are condemned, but _oppression_, when it comes to be _authorized_ by an act of state, and to be publicly _commanded_, though particularly forbidden, becomes a point of _dignity_ and _honor_. What a shame is it for men to interworry one another, when yet the fiercest even of beasts are at peace with those of their own kind? This brutal fury puts philosophy itself to a stand. The drunkard, the glutton, the covetous, may be reduced; nay, and the mischief of it is that no vice keeps itself within its proper bounds. Luxury runs into avarice, and when the reverence of virtue is extinguished, men will stick at nothing that carries profit along with it; man’s blood is shed in wantonness—his death is a spectacle for entertainment, and his groans are music. When Alexander delivered up Lysimachus to a lion, how glad would he have been to have had nails and teeth to have devoured him himself: it would have too much derogated, he thought, from the dignity of his wrath, to have appointed a _man_ for the execution of his friend. Private cruelties, it is true, cannot do much mischief, but in princes they are a war against mankind.