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Article 3: Introduction by Prof. Jesse Beery

 

ANY HORSE CAN BE CURED

   All horses can be subdued. Some are harder than others, owing to their disposition, or the handling they have had; but they all have a degree of practical intelligence and that is all that is necessary for the horse to have in order to train him. I use the term practical intelligence, meaning the power to profit by experience.

 

   A great many people give the horse credit for a great deal more intelligence than he deserves, and some would even give him the power of reason. While I say more on this subject, later in the lessons. I will tell you my view on that right here. The horse does not have the power to reason. To illustrate, take a horse that is bad to shoe. You might make him gentle to have three of his, feet handled, and, if you did not educate the other foot, he would be as hard to manage, while having that foot shod, as if you had not handled the other three. If the horse could reason, he would know that, if you could handle of his feet without hurting him, you could the fourth. I could give one illustration after another, on this point, because I have proven the statement on every horse I have ever trained.

 

   This idea that so many people have, about a horse’s ability to reason, does not benefit the horse, but does him more harm than good, in ninety-nine cases out of one hundred. This harm is generally caused by people punishing the horse for not obeying certain commands, or signals, which he has never been taught and which because of his inability to reason, he cannot understand. There is nothing more harmful to the horse than to punish him when he does not know what it is for.

 

HORSE’S BRAIN IS DIFFERENT

   The horse is larger and stronger than man physically and is often keener in the senses of seeing, hearing and feeling; but he is by no means equal to man mentally. I have examined the brain of different horses and I have found that it is much smaller in proportion to the size of the body, and much simpler, than that of the human being.

   So, here is a general point of information in handling horses: Use your brain more than your muscle. If you were to go into a contest with the horse, and use your strength alone, you would lose out, because he is much the stronger; but, having your ability to reason out things from cause to effect, there is no reason why you should ever fail to gain your point with the horse. It is only as you take advantage of the horse’s inability to reason that you are able to accomplish anything with him. It does not require a great deal of muscle, or strength, to train horses; it does take knowledge.

 

   When you begin to train the colt, or horse, remember that, since he cannot reason, you are fixing impressions all the time, and these by constant repetitions, become habits. If the wrong impressions are repeated, he will have, what we call, a bad habit; if the right impressions are repeated, he will have, what we call, a good habit.

 

HORSE DOESN’T KNOW GOOD HABIT FROM A BAD ONE

Right here, I am going to tell you something the majority of people do not know, and that is that a habit is neither good nor bad to the horse. The worst outlaw it is possible to find may kick, bite, strike, balk and do everything under the sun that we consider bad, but he simply has a misunderstanding. He does not know what we want of him; he does not know that we consider his habits bad. He bites and strikes at us because he is afraid we will hurt him. If we try to subdue him, and he whips us out by striking and we do not punish him for it, at the right time, we have taught him to strike; or, if he did have the habit before we have made the impression just a little deeper.

 

   So, whenever a horse has a bad habit, it means there has been poor management some place along the line, either in colt training, or allowing him to acquire the habit later.