THE SPURS AND THEIR EFFECTS 



first law of motion as set forth in his Principia. The 

 body, once set in motion by a force, continues after 

 the force is withdrawn to move forward in the same 

 direction until another force interferes. The horse, 

 therefore, without further spurring, continues to 

 advance at the same speed, until something else 

 occurs. 



This, then, is what we mean by the "attack" 

 of the spurs; nothing brutal, sudden, sharp, or 

 unexpected, merely the supplementing of the effect 

 of the legs, which alone were not sufficient. But 

 the animal has life, and consequently, senses and 

 will. It does, for a time, continue to go forward in 

 a state of equilibrium, under the impulse of the 

 original force. Sooner or later, however, some 

 new sensation becomes a disturbing force. It loses 

 its uniform motion in a straight line, and with it 

 the state of equilibrium. Thereupon, hand and legs, 

 spurs, if necessary, must again come into action. 



In such a case, the spurs are a corrective, not by 

 their own direct effect, but because they help to 

 restore the state of equilibrium, and thus to inhibit 

 the animars own will, which is the disturbing force. 

 But though the good-will of the horse is a pleasant 

 state, it really is very little matter what the horse 

 thinks. The only point is submission to the will of 

 the rider, who, by complete and continual control 

 of the physical horse, sets quite on one side the will 

 of the moral horse. Then and only then is the horse 

 an utter captive, unable to disobey, unable to move 



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