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 AntÆus, 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 the sources that foster and reinforce ignorance. But as persistent labor conducted the beneficent waters of the Nile in irrigating channels through the arid plain of the desert, until upon the inhospitable edge gardens bloomed, fields of grain waved in the breeze, and the date-palm cast its grateful shade upon the husbandman—so we make healthful progress, and enjoy a widely increasing triple reward—first, in the thankful esteem of our fellow men; secondly, in the relief we afford to a noble animal; and last, in the substantial return which the highest authority has adjudged to honest labor.

REGULAR WORK.

We wish all readers of this book to understand that the directions herein given for shoeing apply to horses whose owners expect them to work regularly after shoeing—from the very hour in which the shoes are set.

We do not propose to "lay up" horses, or to put them to rest in "loose boxes," nor yet to "turn them out to grass." One of the chief difficulties we have had with wealthy owners has been from the tendency to keep the horse out of work when we have got him into a condition where we want exercise to stimulate the alterative process we propose.

A cure of any foot disease we have described, will be much more rapidly effected if the horse has his regular work upon the roads or pavements to which he is accustomed, no matter how hard they are.

We hope that it has also been noticed, that we do not propose to cure spavins, splints, navicular disease, or to restore the natural action of a horse where ossification of cartilage is well established.