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