Quotations about Horses

There is something about the outside of a horse that is good for the inside of a man. ~Winston Churchill


Horse sense is the thing a horse has which keeps it from betting on people. ~W.C. Fields


Riding: The art of keeping a horse between you and the ground. ~Author Unknown


It is not enough for a man to know how to ride; he must know how to fall. ~Mexican Proverb


The wagon rests in winter, the sleigh in summer, the horse never. ~Yiddish Proverb


Many people have sighed for the 'good old days' and regretted the 'passing of the horse,' but today, when only those who like horses own them, it is a far better time for horses. ~C.W. Anderson


No hour of life is wasted that is spent in the saddle. ~Winston Churchill


People on horses look better than they are. People in cars look worse than they are. ~Marya Mannes


Horses and children, I often think, have a lot of the good sense there is in the world. ~Josephine Demott Robinson


It's always been and always will be the same in the world: The horse does the work and the coachman is tipped. ~Author Unknown


Heaven is high and earth wide. If you ride three feet higher above the ground than other men, you will know what that means. ~Rudolf C. Binding


He knows when you're happy
He knows when you're comfortable
He knows when you're confident
And he always knows when you have carrots.
~Author Unknown


The wind of heaven is that which blows between a horse's ears. ~Arabian Proverb


Ah, steeds, steeds, what steeds! Has the whirlwind a home in your manes? Is there a sensitive ear, alert as a flame, in your every fiber? Hearing the familiar song from above, all in one accord you strain your bronze chests and, hooves barely touching the ground, turn into straight lines cleaving the air, and all inspired by God it rushes on! ~Nikolai V. Gogol, Dead Souls, 1842, translated from Russian (above is combination of translations by Bernard Guildert Guerney, Richard Peaver, and Larisa Voloklonsky)


To ride a horse is to ride the sky. ~Author Unknown


There is no secret so close as that between a rider and his horse. ~Robert Smith Surtees, "Chapter XXX: Bolting the Badger," Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour, 1853


A horse loves freedom, and the weariest old work horse will roll on the ground or break into a lumbering gallop when he is turned loose into the open. ~Gerald Raferty


I bless the hoss from hoof to head -
From head to hoof, and tale to mane! -
I bless the hoss, as I have said,
From head to hoof, and back again!
~James Whitcomb Riley


Horses are uncomfortable in the middle and dangerous at both ends. ~Attributed to both Christopher Stone and Ian Fleming


It's a lot like nuts and bolts - if the rider's nuts, the horse bolts! ~Nicholas Evans


A lovely horse is always an experience.... It is an emotional experience of the kind that is spoiled by words. ~Beryl Markham


I can always tell which is the front end of a horse, but beyond that, my art is not above the ordinary. ~Mark Twain


The horses paw and prance and neigh,
Fillies and colts like kittens play,
And dance and toss their rippled manes
Shining and soft as silken skeins;...
~Oliver Wendell Holmes


...I heard a neigh. Oh, such a brisk and melodious neigh as that was! My very heart leaped with delight at the sound. ~Nathaniel Hawthorne, "The Chimæra," A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys, 1852 (about Pegasus)


A thousand horse and none to ride! -
With flowing tail, and flying mane,
Wide nostrils never stretched by pain,
Mouths bloodless to the bit or rein,
And feet that iron never shod,
And flanks unscarred by spur or rod,
A thousand horse, the wild, the free,
Like waves that follow o'er the sea,
Came thickly thundering on,...
~Lord Byron, XVII, Mazeppa, 1818


A horse is the projection of peoples' dreams about themselves - strong, powerful, beautiful - and it has the capability of giving us escape from our mundane existence. ~Pam Brown


The essential joy of being with horses is that it brings us in contact with the rare elements of grace, beauty, spirit, and fire. ~Sharon Ralls Lemon


All I pay my psychiatrist is the cost of feed and hay, and he'll listen to me any day. ~Author Unknown



When I bestride him, I soar, I am a hawk: he trots the air; the earth sings when he touches it; the basest horn of his hoof is more musical than the pipe of Hermes. ~William Shakespeare, Henry V


A Hibernian sage once wrote that there are three things a man never forgets: The girl of his early youth, a devoted teacher, and a great horse. ~C.J.J. Mullen


A canter is a cure for every evil. ~Benjamin Disraeli


If the world was truly a rational place, men would ride sidesaddle. ~Rita Mae Brown


A man on a horse is spiritually as well as physically bigger than a man on foot. ~John Steinbeck


Among all the sights of the docks, the noble truck-horses are not the least striking to a stranger. They are large and powerful brutes, with such sleek and glossy coats, that they look as if brushed and put on by a valet every morning. They march with a slow and stately step, lifting their ponderous hoofs like royal Siam elephants. Thou shalt not lay stripes upon these Roman citizens; for their docility is such, they are guided without rein or lash; they go or come, halt or march on, at a whisper. So grave, dignified, gentlemanly, and courteous did these fine truck-horses look - so full of calm intelligence and sagacity, that often I endeavored to get into conversation with them, as they stood in contemplative attitudes while their loads were preparing. But all I could get from them was the mere recognition of a friendly neigh; though I would stake much upon it that, could I have spoken in their language, I would have derived from them a good deal of valuable information touching the docks, where they passed the whole of their dignified lives. ~Herman Melville, Redburn. His First Voyage, 1849


A horse is worth more than riches. ~Spanish Proverb


When you're young and you fall off a horse, you may break something. When you're my age, you splatter. ~Roy Rogers


The ass will carry his load, but not a double load; ride not a free horse to death. ~Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote


There is just as much horse sense as ever, but the horses have most of it. ~Author Unknown


Brahma was excessively sparing with earth, water, and fire.... The reckless expenditure of air and ether in his composition was amazing. And, in consequence, he perpetually struggled to outreach the wind, to outrun space itself. Other animals ran only when they had a reason, but the Horse would run for no reason whatever, as if to run out of his own skin. ~Rabindranath Tagore


Look back at our struggle for freedom,
Trace our present day's strength to it's source;
And you'll find that man's pathway to glory
Is strewn with the bones of the horse.
~Author Unknown


In riding a horse we borrow freedom. ~Helen Thomson


It takes a good deal of physical courage to ride a horse. This, however, I have. I get it at about forty cents a flask, and take it as required. ~Stephen Leacock


Feeling down? Saddle up. ~Author Unknown


God forbid that I should go to any Heaven in which there are no horses. ~R.B. Cunninghame Graham, letter to Theodore Roosevelt, 1917


Even an E-type Jaguar looks merely flash beside a really smart pony and trap. ~Marion C. Garretty


Four things greater than all things are, -
Women and Horses and Power and War.
~Rudyard Kipling, "The Ballad of the King's Jest"


For want of a Nail the Shoe was lost; for want of a Shoe the Horse was lost; and for want of a Horse the Rider was lost; being overtaken and slain by the Enemy, all for want of Care about a Horse-shoe Nail. ~Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard's Almanack, June 1758


A horse which stops dead just before a jump and thus propels its rider into a graceful arc provides a splendid excuse for general merriment. ~Duke of Endinburgh


Again the early-morning sun was generous with its warmth. All the sounds dear to a horseman were around me - the snort of the horses as they cleared their throats, the gentle swish of their tails, the tinkle of irons as we flung the saddles over their backs - little sounds of no importance, but they stay in the unconscious library of memory. ~Wynford Vaughan-Thomas


You know horses are smarter than people. You never heard of a horse going broke betting on people. ~Will Rogers


They say princes learn no art truly but the art of horsemanship. The reason is the brave beast is no flatterer. He will throw a prince as soon as his groom. ~Ben Jonson, Discoveries Made Upon Men and Matter and Some Poems, "Illiteratus princeps"


Wherever man has left his footprint in the long ascent from barbarism to civilization we will find the hoofprint of the horse beside it. ~John Moore


Small children are convinced that ponies deserve to see the inside of the house. ~Maya Patel


To me, horses and freedom are synonymous. ~Veryl Goodnight


A horse can lend its rider the speed and strength he or she lacks, but the rider who is wise remembers it is no more than a loan. ~Pam Brown


Where in this wide world can man find nobility without pride,
Friendship without envy,
Or beauty without vanity?
Here, where grace is served with muscle
And strength by gentleness confined
He serves without servility; he has fought without enmity.
There is nothing so powerful, nothing less violent.
There is nothing so quick, nothing more patient.
~Ronald Duncan, "The Horse," 1954


One reason why birds and horses are happy is because they are not trying to impress other birds and horses. ~Dale Carnegie


The horse through all its trials has preserved the sweetness of paradise in its blood. ~Johannes Jensen


Horses lend us the wings we lack. ~Author Unknown


Good people get cheated, just as good horses get ridden. ~Chinese Proverb


I'd rather have a goddam horse. A horse is at least human, for God's sake. ~J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye


Spending that many hours in the saddle gave a man plenty of time to think. That's why so many cowboys fancied themselves Philosophers. ~Charles M. Russell


I go about looking at horses and cattle. They eat grass, make love, work when they have to, bear their young. I am sick with envy of them. ~Sherwood Anderson


Somewhere in time's own space
There must be some sweet pastured place
Where creeks sing on and tall trees grow
Some paradise where horses go,
For by the love that guides my pen
I know great horses live again.
~Stanley Harrison


People have always cared me a bit, you see - they're so complicated. I suppose that's why I prefer horses. ~From the movie Separate Tables, 1958


There are unknown worlds of knowledge in brutes; and whenever you mark a horse, or a dog, with a peculiarly mild, calm, deep-seated eye, be sure he is an Aristotle or a Kant, tranquilly speculating upon the mysteries in man. No philosophers so thoroughly comprehend us as dogs and horses. They see through us at a glance. And after all, what is a horse but a species of four-footed dumb man, in a leathern overall, who happens to live upon oats, and toils for his masters, half-requited or abused, like the biped hewers of wood and drawers of water? But there is a touch of divinity even in brutes, and a special halo about a horse, that should forever exempt him from indignities. As for those majestic, magisterial truck-horses of the docks, I would as soon think of striking a judge on the bench, as to lay violent hand upon their holy hides. ~Herman Melville, Redburn. His First Voyage, 1849


The horse is God's gift to mankind. ~Arabian Proverb


In my opinion, a horse is the animal to have. Eleven-hundred pounds of raw muscle, power, grace, and sweat between your legs - it's something you just can't get from a pet hamster. ~Author Unknown


If your horse says no, you either asked the wrong question, or asked the question wrong. ~Pat Parelli


Gipsy gold does not chink and glitter. It gleams in the sun and neighs in the dark. ~Attributed to the Claddaugh Gypsies of Galway


A woman needs two animals - the horse of her dreams and a jackass to pay for it. ~Author Unknown


I prefer a bike to a horse. The brakes are more easily checked. ~Lambert Jeffries


What delight
To back the flying steed, that challenges
The wind for speed! - seems native more of air
Than earth! - whose burden only lends him fire! -
Whose soul, in his task, turns labour into sport;
Who makes your pastime his! I sit him now!
He takes away my breath! He makes me reel!
I touch not earth - I see not - hear not. All
Is ecstasy of motion!
~James Sheridan Knowles, The Love-Chase


Horses - if God made anything more beautiful, he kept it for himself. ~Author Unknown


If you want a stable friendship, get a horse. ~Author Unknown


He's of the colour of the nutmeg. And of the heat of the ginger.... he is pure air and fire; and the dull elements of earth and water never appear in him, but only in patient stillness while his rider mounts him; he is indeed a horse, and all other jades you may call beasts. ~William Shakespeare, Henry V


My horse's feet are as swift as rolling thunder
He carries me away from all my fears
And when the world threatens to fall asunder
His mane is there to wipe away my tears.
~Bonnie Lewis


And Allah took a handful of southerly wind, blew His breath over it, and created the horse.... Thou shall fly without wings, and conquer without any sword. Oh, horse. ~Bedouin Legend


A horse doesn't care how much you know, until he knows how much you care. ~Pat Parelli


Men are generally more careful of the Breed of their Horses and Dogs than of their Children. ~William Penn, Fruits of Solitude


A dog may be man's best friend, but the horse wrote history. ~Author Unknown


The hooves of horses!
Oh! witching and sweet
Is the music earth steals from the iron-shod feet;
No whisper of lover, no trilling of bird,
Can stir me as much as hooves of horses
Have stirred.
~Will H. Ogilvie


The daughter who won't lift a finger in the house is the same child who cycles madly off in the pouring rain to spend all morning mucking out a stable. ~Samantha Armstrong


He flung himself upon his horse and rode madly off in all directions. ~Stephen Leacock


Why did this animal that had prospered so in the Colorado desert leave his amiable homeland for Siberia? There is no answer. We know that when the horse negotiated the land bridge... he found on the other end an opportunity for varied development that is one of the bright aspects of animal history. He wandered into France and became the mighty Percheron, and into Arabia, where he developed into a lovely poem of a horse, and into Africa where he became the brilliant zebra, and into Scotland, where he bred selectively to form the massive Clydesdale. He would also journey into Spain, where his very name would become the designation for gentleman, a caballero, a man of the horse. There he would flourish mightily and serve the armies that would conquer much of the known world. ~James Michener


A horse is poetry in motion. ~Author Unknown


A Horseman should know neither fear, nor anger. ~James Rarey


She lifted the drooping muzzle with both hands... It was a special embrace saved for special occasions. ~Jean M. Auel


O! for a horse with wings! ~William Shakespeare, Cymbeline


Horse sense, n.: Stable thinking. ~Author Unknown


Men are better when riding, more just and more understanding, and more alert and more at ease and more under-taking, and better knowing of all countries and all passages; in short and long all good customs and manners cometh thereof, and the health of man and of his soul. ~Attributed to Edward Plantagenet


Thanks to Betsy Caldwell for submitting some of these quotes.