Q. What kind of bit is suitable for a horse?
A. An easy bit.
Q. Why is an easy bit necessary for all horses, whatever may be their resistance?
A. Because the effect of a severe bit is to constrain and surprise a horse, while it ought to prevent him from doing wrong and enable him to do well. Now, we cannot obtain these results except by the aid of an easy bit, and above all, of a skillful hand; for the bit is the hand, and a good hand is the whole of the rider.
Q. Are there any other inconveniences connected with the instruments of torture called severe bits?
A. Certainly there are, for the horse soon learns to avoid the painful infliction of them by forcing the rider's legs, the power of which can never be equal to that of this barbarous bit. He succeeds in this by yielding with his body, and resisting with his neck and jaw, which misses altogether the aim proposed.
Q. How is it that nearly all the horsemen of renown have invented a particular kind of bit?
A. Because being wanting in personal science, they sought to replace their own insufficiency by aids or strange machines.
Q. Can the horse, perfectly in hand, defend himself?
A. No; for the just distribution of weight that this position gives supposes a great regularity of movement, and it would be necessary to overturn this order that any act of rebellion on the part of the horse should take place.