With the Gauls exhausted and thoroughly subdued, Caesar returned with his legions to Italy free of care, fearing no risings of the Gauls behind him, and knowing for certain that he had left behind hardly any who would either dare to rise or, if they rose, were to be feared.
1 Exhaustis atque edomitis Gallis securus Caesar cum legionibus in Italiam rediit, nullos post se Gallorum motus pertimescens, certo se sciens minime aliquos, qui uel moueri audeant uel si moueantur timendi sint, reliquisse.
I should like now to set before our eyes Gaul, bloodless and exhausted: how she fares after those most burning fevers and the inward heats that scorched the better part of her vitals; with what wasting and what pallor she is marked; how dejected and enfeebled she lies; how she dreads even the movements of necessary duty, lest they bring back the same onset of evils.
2 constitui nunc ante oculos uelim exsanguem defectamque Galliam, post illas ardentissimas febres internosque aestus uitalium meliora torrentes ut sese habeat, quanta macie quantoque pallore sit, quam demissa ac resoluta iaceat, quam ipsos quoque necessarii officii motus, ne eundem incursum malorum reuocent, pertimescat.
For the Roman army fell upon her with a sudden onset, like a stronger plague upon a very strong body, which burns the more fiercely the more impatiently it is borne.
3 inruit enim in eam repentino impetu Romanus exercitus ueluti fortissimo corpori fortior lues, quae tanto grauius accenditur, quanto inpatientius toleratur.
The wretched land thirsted, when, with the sword at her throat, she was compelled to profess a pledge of eternal slavery, her hostages torn from her besides; she thirsted, as I have said, for that well-known sweetness of liberty, the sweetest of all things to all, like the sweetness of cold water; and the more she understood it to be withdrawn from her, the more greedily she longed for it.
4 sitiebat misera, cum instante gladio profiteri sponsionem seruitutis aeternae auulsis insuper obsidibus cogeretur; sitiebat, ut dixi, notam illam omnibusque suauissimam uelut aquae gelidae dulcedinem libertatis, quantoque eam magis subtrahi intellegebat; tanto auidius desiderabat.
Hence that so frequent presumption against what was forbidden: an untimely liberty was grasped at for the sake of defending liberty; and because this seemed to stamp out a destruction ill conceived, it only increased the licence, already seized, of possessing her insatiably.
5 hinc illa tam frequens contra uetita praesumptio: inuadebatur pro defendenda libertate inportuna libertas praereptamque insatiabiliter potiundi licentiam, quod male conceptam perniciem restinguere uidebatur, augebat.
Hence the Roman was a craftier plotter before battle, hence a fiercer enemy in battle, hence a more merciless victor after battle; hence everything grew more cruel in order to tame her impatience; hence no trust was placed any longer even in remedies.
6 hinc Romanus ante pugnam insidiator argutior, hinc in pugna hostis infestior, hinc post pugnam uictor immitior, hinc omnia ad domandam inpatientiam crudescentia, hinc iam nec remediis credebatur.
And so, if I could ask this nation of which we speak what it judged of those times then, when it was suffering these very things, it would answer, I think, saying: “That fever left me so bloodless then, and made me so cold, that not even this one, which has grazed almost all, could heat me or stir me; and the Romans so bowed me down that I shall not rise up even against the Goths.”
7 itaque si interrogare possem hanc de qua loquimur nationem, quid tunc, cum haec ipsa sustinebat, de illis temporibus iudicarit, responderet ut arbitror dicens: 'sic me illa tunc febris exsanguem reddidit ac frigidam fecit, ut etiam haec, quae omnes paene perstrinxit, feruefacere uel commouere nequiuerit, atque ita me Romani inclinauerunt, ut nec ad Gothos surgam'.
But not even Rome herself escaped the disasters she inflicted. Long exercised and increased throughout all the quarters of the world were the powers of the generals and the strength of the legions, which, clashing with one another, would conquer to her loss and be conquered at her peril. For civil wars attended Caesar on his return victorious from Gaul; and other most grievous evils — the killing of Crassus among the Parthians and the slaughter of his army — had gone before.
8 sed ne ipsa quidem Roma clades, quas intulit, euitauit. exercitae diu auctaeque sunt per totos mundi cardines potentiae ducum uiresque legionum, quae in sese concurrentes eius damno uincerent, cuius periculo uincerentur. nam uictorem Caesarem de Gallia reuersum ciuilia bella comitata sunt aliaque grauissima mala, interfecti apud Parthos Crassi et trucidati exercitus, praecesserunt.