Page:Herschel - A Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy (1831).djvu/72

 than the institution of life-assurances. Nothing is more uncertain than the life of a single individual; and it is the sense of this insecurity which has given rise to such institutions. They are, in their nature and objects, the precise reverse of gambling speculations, their object being to equalize vicissitude, and to place the pecuniary relations of numerous masses of mankind, in so far as they extend, on a footing independent of individual casualty. To do this with the greatest possible advantage, or indeed with any advantage at all, it is necessary to know the laws of mortality, or the average numbers of individuals, out of a great multitude, who die at every period of life from infancy to extreme old age. At first sight this would seem a hopeless enquiry; to some, perhaps, a presumptuous one. But it has been made; and the result is, that, abating extraordinary causes, such as wars, pestilence, and the like, a remarkable regularity does obtain, quite sufficient to afford grounds not only for general estimations, but for nice calculations of risk and adventure, such as infallibly to insure the success of any such institution founded on good computations; and thus to confer such stability on the fortunes of families dependent on the exertions of one individual as to constitute an important feature in modern civilization. The only thing to be feared in such institutions is their too great multiplication and consequent competition, by which a spirit of gambling and underbidding is liable to be generated among their conductors, and the very mischief may be produced, on a scale of frightful extent, which they are especially intended to prevent.