The History of Rome, Books 37 to the End: with the Epitomes and Fragments of the Lost BooksLivy
History
The History of Rome, Books 37 to the End: with the Epitomes and Fragments of the Lost Books
Livy
Rome -- History
remote regions? For, what had you to do with the Oroandians, what with
other states equally inoffensive?
“But, in what manner did you conduct this war, on the merit of which you
ask a triumph? Did you fight on equal ground, and at the time of your
own choosing? Indeed you with propriety require that thanks be returned
to the immortal gods; first, because they did not ordain that the army
should undergo the penalty deserved by the temerity of its commander, in
commencing a war in accordance with no law of nations; and next, because
they gave us, for antagonists, brutes, and not men.
46. “Do not suppose that the name only of the Gallogræcians is a mixed
one: their bodies, and their minds, have undergone a similar process,
and have been corrupted by the mixture. Had they been such Gauls as
those whom we have a thousand times encountered in Italy, with various
success, would any one of us, considering the conduct of our commander,
have returned to tell the story? Two battles were fought; twice he
sustained the disadvantages of position, and, at the bottom of a valley,
almost placed his army under the feet of the enemy; so that they were
able to overwhelm us, even though they did not cast their weapons from
the higher ground, but merely threw themselves on us without arms. What,
then, was the consequence? Great is the fortune of the Roman people;
great and terrible its name! By the recent downfall of Hannibal, Philip,
and Antiochus, the Gauls were, in a manner, thunder-struck. Bulky as
their bodies were, they were dismayed, and put to flight, by slings and
arrows; not a sword was stained in battle during the Gallic war. Like
flocks of birds, they flew away at the very sound of our missiles. But,
indeed, when we, the same army, were on our return, and happened to fall
in with a party of Thracian robbers, (as if fortune meant to teach us
what the issue would have been, if we had met an enemy,) we were beaten,
routed, and stripped of our baggage. Among many other brave soldiers
fell Quintus Minucius Thermus, whose death was a much greater loss, than
if Cneius Manlius, to whose rashness the misfortune had happened, had
perished. An army, carrying home the spoils of king Antiochus, was
dispersed in three places, and with the vanguard in one place, the rear
in another, and the baggage in a third, hid itself for a night among
bushes, in the dens of wild beasts. Is a triumph demanded for such
exploits as these? Although no disaster and disgrace had been suffered
in Thrace, over what enemies would you triumph? Over those, I suppose,
whom the Roman senate or people had assigned to you as your enemies. On
these grounds, indeed, a triumph was granted to Lucius Scipio; to Manius
Acilius, over king Antiochus; to Titus Quintius, over king Philip; and
to Publius Africanus, over Hannibal, the Carthaginians, and Syphax. Now,
after the senate had voted a declaration of war, the following
unimportant matters were inquired into:—To whom the declaration ought to
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