page 77 note * It will be noticed that I do not accept the distinction laid down by some authors as to the use of the words assurance and insurance, by which the former is restricted t o life and the latter to fire risks. The more correct distinction I believe to be that a man insures the life of himself or of some other person, or his house, or his ships, or the fidelity of his servants; and that the Office assures to him in each of these cases a sum of money payable in certain contingencies. Hence the Office is called the assurer, or assurers, and the man the assured; while we may speak either of the life assured, or the life insured; also of the sum assured, or the sum insured; according as we take the point of view of the Office or of the individual. So also we may speak either of “Life Insurance” or of “Life Assurance”; as, for instance, we may say that a man believes in the duty and advantage of life insurance, or that a certain Company finds the business of life assurance very profitable.

page 84 note * As regards the spelling adopted here and subsequently, I submit that the analogy of other English words requires that a person who vends, should be called a vender; a person who invests, an invester; and a person who deposits, a depositor; just as we speak of a seller, a lender, or a borrower. The adoption of this spelling in these and other cases where it is applicable (as in the words visiter, governer, directer) would remove one of the many anomalies prevailing in the English language; and in comparison with this object, the argument from the derivation of the words appears quite futile. In fact, i t should be the aim of every lover of his native language to efface as quickly as possible, rather than carefully perpetuate, every mark of the different sources from which the words he uses Have been derived.