Cicero, who was himself present at the spectacle of the Circus, in a letter to a friend, Marcus Marius, writes:-- “What followed, for five days, was successive combats between a man and a wild beast. (_Venationes binæ._) It was magnificent. No one disputes it. But what pleasure can it be to a person of refinement, when either a weak man is torn to pieces by a very powerful beast, or a noble animal is struck through by a hunting spear?... The last day was that of the elephants, in which there was great astonishment on the part of the populace and crowd, but no enjoyment. Indeed there followed a degree of compassion, and a certain idea that there is a sort of fellowship between that huge animal and the human race.” (Cicero, _Ep. ad Diversos_ vii., 1.) Testimonies which might induce one almost to think that, had not they been systematically and industriously accustomed to these horrible and gigantic butcheries by their rulers, even the Roman populace might have been susceptible of better feelings and desires than those inspired by their amphitheatres, though these savage exhibitions were perhaps hardly worse than the combats and slaughter in the bull-rings of Seville or Madrid, or at the courts of the Mohammedan princes of India recently sanctioned by the presence of English royalty. It is worth noting, in passing, that while the _gladiatorial_ slaughters were discontinued some years after the triumph of Christianity, the other part of the entertainment--the indiscriminate combats and slaughter of the _non-human_ victims--continued to be exhibited to a much later period. If we reflect that the rise of the humanitarian spirit in Christian Europe, or rather in the better section of it, is of very recent origin, it might appear unreasonable to look for any distinct exhibition of so exalted a feeling in the younger age of the world. Yet, to the shame of more advanced civilisations, we find manifestations of it in the writings of a few of the more refined minds of Greece and Italy; and Plutarch and Seneca--the former particularly--occupy a distinguished place amongst the first preachers of that sacred truth.[23]