7. For _a penny a day_, a young man or woman of twenty-four may secure
the sum of £100, payable on reaching the age of sixty, with the right of
withdrawing four-fifths of the amount paid in, at any time; the whole of
the payments being paid back in event of death occurring before the age
of sixty.
Such is the power of _a penny a day!_ Who would have thought it? Yet it
is true, as any one can prove by looking at the tables of the best
assurance offices. Put the penny a day in the bank, and it accumulates
slowly. Even there, however, it is very useful. But with the assurance
office it immediately assumes a vast power. A penny a day paid in by the
man of thirty-one, is worth £60 to his wife and family, in the event of
his dying next month or next year! It is the combining of small savings
for purposes of mutual assurance, by a large number of persons, that
gives to the penny its enormous power.
The effecting of a life assurance by a working man, for the benefit of
his wife and children, is an eminently unselfish act. It is a moral as
well as a religious transaction. It is "providing for those of his own
household." It is taking the right step towards securing the
independence of his family, after he, the bread-winner, has been called
away. This right investment of _the pennies_ is the best proof of
practical virtue, and of the honest forethought and integrity of a true
man.
The late Joseph Baxendale was the constant friend of the working people
who co-operated with him in the labours of his life. He was a man of
strong common sense, and might have been styled the Franklin of
Business. He was full of proverbial wisdom, and also full of practical
help. He was constantly urging his servants to lay by something for a
rainy day, or for their support in old age. He also used to pension off
his old servants after they had ceased to be able to work.
He posted up Texts along his warehouses, so that those who ran might
read. "Never despair," "Nothing without labour," "He who spends all he
gets, is on the way to beggary," "Time lost cannot be regained," "Let
industry, temperance, and economy be the habits of your lives." These
texts were printed in large type, so that every passer-by might read
them; while many were able to lay them to heart, and to practise the
advices which they enjoined.
On other occasions Mr. Baxendale would distribute amongst his
workpeople, or desire to be set up in his warehouses and places of
business, longer and more general maxims. He would desire these printed
documents to be put up in the offices of the clerks, or in places where
men are disposed to linger, or to take their meals, or to assemble
preparatory to work. They were always full of valuable advice. We copy
one of them, on the Importance of Punctuality:--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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