The TREFACE. 



was not only hinifelfan excellent Horfeman, but the 

 belt Jugde thic ever wrote upon the Subject. 



But all this while it does not appear that there has 

 been any Provilion made for the Cure of the Infirmi- 

 ties a/id Accidents to which that noble and generous 

 Creature is expofed, fuitable to what his Services 

 really deferve i for albeit the fame Perfons who were 

 thefirfllmproversof FIorrwHianlhip, were no lefs ftu- 

 dious of their Difeafes, and were alio the firft of all 

 the Moderns, who feem to have writ profefledly of 

 them •, yet it muft be owned their Writings are more 

 like Syftems of old Jjlrology, than as if they had been 

 compofed for the Cure of Horfes : Neither can this 

 be thought very ftrange, if it be confidered, that 

 thefe Authors had no other Means of arriving at their 

 Skillj but by adding from Books of Phyuck and Sur- 

 gery, what they judg'd neceffary to perfect the 

 common and receiv'd Practice of Farriers, which in 

 thofe Times was of a very mafculine Kind, and had 

 been handed down through many ignorant Ages, 

 without any other Regulation, than what had ob- 

 tain'd by Rote and Cuftom. 



Now it is very eafy to conceive, how thofe who 

 are uninflruded in the Principles of any particular 

 Art, may be milled in what they copy and borrow 

 from it •, for as they are not Judges themfelves, ihey 

 will neither be apt to make choice of the belt Au- 

 thors -, nor can it be fuppofed, if they did, that they 

 fhould mend the Matter very much, in a Science fo 

 much complicated as that of Phyfick, ^c. and which 

 by the Ignorance of thofe and the preceeding Times, 

 wasitfelf embarrafs'd with many idle and whimfical 

 Dreams, not to be met with, or at leaft depended on 

 by ancient Writers, and which have been abfolutely 

 rejeded fince the modern Difcoveries have cleared 

 the Way to true Knowledge. 



And that this was the Cafe of thefe Gentlemen who 

 firft put Pen to Paper on the Difeafes of Horfes, is 

 evident from their unjudicious Colledions, for in them 



we 



