king classes.

It might possibly take a long time to save enough money to provide for
those who are dependent upon us; and there is always the temptation to
encroach upon the funds set apart for death, which--as most people
suppose--may be a far-distant event. So that saving bit by bit, from
week to week, cannot always be relied upon.

The person who joins an assurance society is in a different position.
His annual or quarterly saving becomes at once a portion of a general
fund, sufficient to realize the intention of the assured. At the moment
that he makes his first payment, his object is attained. Though he die
on the day after his premium has been paid, his widow and children will
receive the entire amount of his assurance.

This system, while it secures a provision to his survivors, at the same
time incites a man to the moral obligation of exorcising foresight and
prudence, since through its means these virtues may be practised, and
their ultimate reward secured. Not the least of the advantages attending
life assurance is the serenity of mind which attends the provident man
when lying on a bed of sickness, or when he is in prospect of death,--so
unlike that painful anxiety for the future welfare of a family, which
adds poignancy to bodily suffering, and retards or defeats the power of
medicine. The poet Burns, in writing to a friend a few days before his
death, said that he was "still the victim of affliction. Alas! Clark, I
begin to fear the worst. Burns' poor widow, and half a dozen of his dear
little ones helpless orphans;--there, I am weak as a woman's tear.
Enough of this,--_'tis half my disease_!"

Life assurance may be described as a joint-stock plan for securing
widows, and children from want. It is an arrangement by means of which a
large number of persons agree to lay by certain small sums called
"premiums," yearly, to accumulate at interest, as in a savings bank,
against the contingency of the assurer's death,--when the amount of the
sum subscribed for is forthwith handed over to his survivors. By this
means, persons possessed of but little capital, though enjoying regular
wages or salaries, however small, may at once form a fund for the
benefit of their family at death.

We often hear of men who have been diligent and useful members of
society, dying and leaving their wives and families in absolute poverty.
They have lived in respectable style, paid high rents for their houses,
dressed well, kept up