Discourses on Livy

Why it has been and still may be affirmed of the Gauls, that at the beginning of a fray they are more than men, but afterwards less than women.

The bravery of the Gaul who on the banks of the Anio challenged any among the Romans to fight with him, and the combat that thereupon ensued between him and Titus Manlius, remind me of what Titus Livius oftener than once observes in his history, that "at the beginning of a fray the Gauls are more than men, but ere it is ended show themselves less than women."