very God for whom he exercises himself: he will cry out that he cannot
endure it. Great is the force of custom! Sportsmen will continue whole
nights in the snow; they will bear being almost frozen upon the
mountains. From practice boxers will not so much as utter a groan,
however bruised by the cestus. But what do you think of those to whom a
victory in the Olympic games seemed almost on a par with the ancient
consulships of the Roman people? What wounds will the gladiators bear,
who are either barbarians, or the very dregs of mankind! How do they,
who are trained to it, prefer being wounded to basely avoiding it! How
often do they prove that they consider nothing but the giving
satisfaction to their masters or to the people! for when covered with
wounds, they send to their masters to learn their pleasure: if it is
their will, they are ready to lie down and die. What gladiator, of even
moderate reputation, ever gave a sigh? who ever turned pale? who ever
disgraced himself either in the actual combat, or even when about to
die? who that had been defeated ever drew in his neck to avoid the
stroke of death? So great is the force of practice, deliberation, and
custom! Shall this, then, be done by

A Samnite rascal, worthy of his trade;

and shall a man born to glory have so soft a part in his soul as not to
be able to fortify it by reason and reflection? The sight of the
gladiators' combats is by some looked on as cruel and inhuman, and I do
not know, as it is at present managed, but it may be so; but when the
guilty fought, we might receive by our ears perhaps (but certainly by
our eyes we could not) better training to harden us against pain and
death.

XVIII. I have now said enough about the effects of exercise, custom,