Page:A philosophical essay on probabilities Tr. Truscott, Emory 1902.djvu/165

Rh he expects. Indeed this kind of assurance always leaves uncertainty as to the loss which one may fear. But this uncertainty diminishes in proportion as the number of policy-holders increases; the moral advantage increases more and more and ends by coinciding with the mathematical advantage, its natural limit. This renders the association of mutual assurances when it is very numerous more advantageous to the assured ones than the companies of assurance which, in proportion to the benefit that they give, give a moral advantage always inferior to the mathematical advantage. But the surveillance of their administration can balance the advantage of the mutual assurances. All these results are, as has already been seen, independent of the law which expresses the moral advantage.

One may look upon a free people as a great association whose members secure mutually their properties by supporting proportionally the charges of this guaranty. The confederation of several peoples would give to them advantages analogous to those which each individual enjoys in the society. A congress of their representatives would discuss objects of a utility common to all and without doubt the system of weights, measures, and moneys proposed by the French scientists would be adopted in this congress as one of the things most useful to commerical relations.

Among the institutions founded upon the probabilities of human life the better ones are those in which, by means of a light sacrifice of his revenue, one assures his existence and that of his family for a time when one ought to fear to be unable to satisfy their needs. As far as games are immoral, so far these institutions