Rational Horse-Shoeing | Page 9

shod and cared for should endure five times as long. In this country horses fail in the feet, and are called old at an age when they should be in the fullest activity. This is a double loss, for every horseman of experience knows that if an old horse is sound and vigorous he has some great advantages over a young one. He is safer in every respect, "way-wise," seasoned, steady, and reliable. He and his owner are old friends and companions and can not part but with a pang of regret. A good horse, well cared for, should work cheerfully until he is thirty years of age; yet how few are able to perform genteel service after fifteen! It is a sad sight that of the high-mettled, noble animal, once the petted darling of wealth, caressed by ladies and children, and guarded so that even the winds of heaven might not visit him too roughly, fallen through the successive grades of equine degradation, until at last he hobbles before a clam-wagon or a swill-cart--a sorry relic of better days.
The question is so plain that we hesitate to argue with intelligent people to prove that, if the old system of shoeing destroys the value of a horse in middle life, half his money value is sacrificed to ignorance--a waste that might be saved were nature's laws regarded. That part of the argument which demands that the faithful, devoted servant merits humane treatment and the best intelligence of the master in securing his health and comfort can not be forgotten and need not be urged upon the attention of the true horseman.

FINAL OBSERVATIONS.
To be rational in any course of action is, primarily, to follow the leading of reason, and by that guidance to arrive at correct conclusions.
It is the opposite to the method which is irrational--regardless of reason, and therefore leading to conclusions erroneous and absurd. Rationalism is opposed to ultraism, to vehement, officious and extreme measures--while it would seek more excellent ways, it holds fast to that which is good.
Rationalism in medicine is the method which recognises nature as the great agent in the cure of disease, and employs art as an auxiliary to be resorted to when useful or necessary, and avoided when prejudicial.
In our treatment of the hoof, we would seek to know the cause of the horse's troubles, firmly believing that he is endowed by nature with strength to perform the service man demands of him, and that he is not necessarily a helpless prey to torturing diseases of the minor organs; and, indeed, subject only to that final, unavoidable sentence, which in some form nature holds suspended over all animate existence.
Having by the aid of reason ascertained the cause of defects, we would assist nature to relieve them; we have therefore called this little hand-book of suggestions from our experience, RATIONAL HORSE-SHOEING.
OPPOSING FORCES.
Having taken upon ourselves to reform evils, rooted deep in old customs, and to abolish abuses older than our civilization, we have to meet with discouragement and opposition in various forms.
Even the enlightened and well-intentioned hold back incredulous. This form of opposition finally examines, being led thereto from motives of economy and the promptings of humanity; it usually approves and assists, but is often carried back by indolence, when it discovers that it must join us in the loud battle we are forced to wage all along the line against fierce interests and bitter prejudices.
We attack with slender array, but unflinching purpose, the gloomy powers of ignorance that are allied to doubt and indifference. These contend under the prestige of a thousand years of possession.
Ignorance and Prejudice are twin giants that renew their life upon each other; they are as old as chaos, and are invulnerable to the weapons of ordinary warfare. Like the fallen angels, they are--
"Vital in every part, And can but by annihilation die."
One of the Greek fables, typifying the struggle of man against circumstances, was a story of the battle between Hercules and Ant?us, son of the Earth. The fight was long and doubtful, for whenever the mortal was felled to the ground by the power of the vigorous god, his force was renewed by contact with the breast of his mother Earth, and he sprang to his feet and recommenced the never-ending strife.
This contest between the god, and the mortal born of earth and sea, is the poetical type of the unceasing toil of man in the Valley of the Nile, against the sandy waves of the Lybian desert, always encroaching upon the cultivated soil, and demanding year by year new exertions to repress their advance.
So, in our attempt to establish a better system of utilizing the powers of the horse in the service of man, we have each day to meet the same enemy, renewed by contact with