DIFFERENT CLASSES OF CORPORATIONS 87 
in the law of averages, it must be frankly stated 
that the point has not been reached where we can 
accept this English theory. Nevertheless, this 
English concern is doing good work for devotees of 
the “distribution of risk” theory, although these 
people are not content with distributing invest 
ments among the nations of the earth, but also 
distribute investments among the different classes 
of securities, the chief of which we will give as 
follows: 
(1) Railroad Securities. 
(2) Lighting Securities. 
(3) Traction Securities. 
(4) Telephone Securities. 
(5) Industrial Securities. 
(6) Real Estate and other Securities. 
The idea of this distribution is that certain lines 
of business are apt to decline, and that it is unsafe 
for one to invest all his money in any one class of 
securities. Although a fair amount of distribution 
is advised, yet when one is confident that certain 
securities are safer than others, why should he 
invest in securities which he believes are less safe 
simply for the purpose of distributing the risk? 
Extended distribution is often a great mistake, for 
if there should be only a very few issues which one 
knew to be absolutely good, he should confine his 
investments exclusively to these. On the other 
hand, many people invest some of their money in 
securities which they know to be doubtful in order 
to distribute the risk, and apparently this was the 
principle that a famous American writer acted