News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1888-12-06
a Timely Thought.

Has it ever occurred to you that
everybody is insured that is, every.
body who owns any piece of property.
or whose life has any money value
Probably this has not occurred to you.
yet it is simply and in the ordinary
meaning of language true that every
body who is not supported at the ex-
pense of somebody else is insured. If
he has not taken out policy in the
usual manner, you ask, how?
No question is easier to answer.
Whenever a piece of property is de-
stroyed the accruing loss falls on
the owner, necessarily. If he holds
contract of indemnity from some as
ISOLATION of property owners called
an insurance company, he is repaid
most of the loss if he does not hold
such contract, he must pay the
whole himself, and get on with it as
well az he can. For easy handling
let us take easy figures. Say that the
property is worth thousand dollars,
and that an insurance policy on it
would cost hursdred dollars a year.
IF YOU pay the 1Ahundred dollars and
take a formal pe.1lcy, you are insured
in the ery-daTSsense of that word.
If you 60 without the policy, you pay
the hundred dollars to yourself by
keeping it in your pocket; this is ex-
cellent, and it is what seems to many
persons economy-but you also take
the risk Of losing the thousand. That
is, you receive your own premium and
issue your own policy-to yourself
and if you should take the trouble to
write out formal policy yourself and
sign and seal it, the fact would not
be altered.
Then is it not perfectly true that
everybody is insured somehow, the
method being the sole place of varia-
ton? And is it not pain that this is
equally true as to human lives ?
There is only one difference: if you
insure your property yourself and
lose it, you have received the premi-
um and pay the ,''policy" if you treat
your life in the same way, you get the
premium, but your family must lose
the property. You are getting the
benefit of the ''saved" premium, or at
least, getting your share of it with
your family, and compelling them to
do the insuriDg.
Now is this fair? Is it business
like? Is it commonsense and reason
AS you would certainly take it to be
reflection upon your intelligence if |
some one should come to you with |
money in hand and without any med |
ical certificate, asking you to write
him out an insurance contract on his |
life-for it would at once seem clear
to YOU, even if you never heard of
average" and could not give a very
ineligible explanation Of the reason,
that you couldn't afford to do any
such thing, and man who thought
you would must take you for fool
how is it that you are insuring your
own life and thus doing what you
would instantly refuse 10 do as to any
other life?
You never thought about it? Yes,
that is the reason, DISCOURSE. But if /
a railroad bridge has been getting
weak it will let train through at the I
proper time, even if nobody has
thought about it. Things happen
Just the same whether thought about
Or not. If forethonght has not been
used, the calamity is not in the least
lVerteG or mo flied. The course off
lumau events meyer accepts "forgot
t" as an excuse, although individuals !
sometimes do. Suppose you do think
about 1t, now, and suppose you also
make action following upon the think I
ng.-EG