"The clay which rests beneath this stone As Silas Wood was widely known. Now, lying here, I ask what good It was to me to be S. Wood. O Man, let not ambition trouble you Is the advice of Silas W." "Richard Haymon, of Heaven, fell to Earth Jan. 20, 1807, and had the dust brushed off him Oct. 3, 1874." INSECTIVORA, n. "See," cries the chorus of admiring preachers, "How Providence provides for all His creatures!" "His care," the gnat said, "even the insects follows: For us He has provided wrens and swallows." Sempen Railey. INSURANCE, n. An ingenious modern game of chance in which the player is permitted to enjoy the comfortable conviction that he is beating the man who keeps the table. Insurance Agent: My dear sir, that is a fine house--pray let me insure it. House Owner: With pleasure. Please make the annual premium so low that by the time when, according to the tables of your actuary, it will probably be destroyed by fire I will have paid you considerably less than the face of the policy. Insurance Agent: O dear, no--we could not afford to do that. We must fix the premium so that you will have paid more. House Owner: How, then, can I afford that? Insurance Agent: Why, your house may burn down at any time. There was Smith's house, for example, which-- House Owner: Spare me--there were Brown's house, on the contrary, and Jones's house, and Robinson's house, which-- Insurance Agent: Spare me! House Owner: Let us understand each other. You want me to pay you money on the supposition that something will occur previously to the time set by yourself for its occurrence. In other words, you expect me to bet that my house will not last so long as it will probably last. Insurance Agent: But if your house burns without insurance it will be a total loss. House Owner: Beg your pardon-- by your own actuary's tables I shall probably have saved, when it burns, all the premiums I would otherwise have paid to you--amounting to more than the face of the policy they would have bought. But suppose it to burn before the time upon which your figures are based. If I could afford that, how could you? Insurance Agent: Oh, we would make ourselves even from our luckier ventures with other clients. Virtually, they pay your loss. House Owner: And virtually, then, don't I help to pay their losses? Are not their houses as likely as mine to burn before they have paid you as much as you must pay them? The case stands this way: You expect to take more money from your clients than you pay to them, do you not? Insurance Agent: Certainly; if we did not-- House Owner: I would not trust you with my money unless you did reference to the whole body of your clients, that they lose money on you it is probable, with reference to any one of them, that he will. It is these individual probabilities that make the aggregate certainty.