There are only two kinds of tactic, between which various modifications occur; that which calculates upon the individual warrior, and that which builds upon masses; so that in the former the mass with its dead weight does not appear at all and is taken no account of, and in the latter the individual vanishes as insignificant. The extremes of these two kinds are represented by the Homeric heroes, and those swarms of Cimbrians who were held together by chains. The remarks however which will be made upon this subject, refer properly to the infantry; respecting the cavalry, for which many things are different, I shall say a little afterwards.

The tactic of barbarians begins with masses: many people have never gone beyond them; others have returned to them again: that the Romans had no other system in the infancy of their military art, is clear from the celebrated passage in Livy, and even from the arms of the hoplites of Servius Tullius. This system was entirely Greek, and in the time of Pisistratus there was unquestionably not the slightest difference between the Roman and Greek tactics. It remained among the Greeks to very late times; the Romans broke up their arrangement very early, long before this time, and changed their arms. It is said that they borrowed them from the Italicans; whether this be so, cannot be ascertained in any way; but so much is certain, that the Italicans were at this time armed and drawn up like the Romans.