I had quoted this passage in a different context a few months ago. It comes from a book which Jimmy Breslin calls the second most important document in the world(the first most important being the payroll):

"Do you give the horse its might?
Do you clothe its neck with mane?

Do you make it leap like the locust?
Its majestic snorting is terrible.

It paws violently, exults mightily;
it goes out to meet the weapons.

It laughs at fear, and is not dismayed;
it does not turn back from the sword.

Upon rattle the quiver,
the flashing spear and the javelin.

With fierceness and rage it swallows the ground;
it can not stand still at the sound of the trumpet.

When the trumpet sounds it says "Aha!"
From a distance it smells the battle,
the thunder of the captains, and the shouting"

Job 39.

"For a living dog is better than a dead lion"

Ecclesiastes.

"They give their lives for our enjoyment"

Ron McInally.

Ironic but not surprising. Laminitis was the biggest threat to this colt from the start. Complex surgical procedures involving bone grafts and screws and plates made of advanced metals, all of the manners in which this colt was monitored, the high tech recovery techniques which were utilized, and Barbaro will most likely succumb to laminitis.

Ironic because despite the best care and technology available, people who live with horses, and the vets who treat these horses, really are no closer to understanding laminitis than they were 25 or 50 years ago.

Laminitis was the greatest fear of Barbaro's veterinary team from the onset, because they were aware that their patient was at high risk of foundering, and the survival rates of even healthy animals who founder is infinitesimal. And even though the veterinary team treating Barbaro knew that laminitis was the greatest threat to the colt, they were in the end apparently unable to prevent it.