MARINE INSURANCE
regard to the business which was done by the members. A.D. 1689
In 1779, they drew up a general form of policy which jg TH
still adhered to, and which has been taken as the model
for marine insurance business all over the world’, It is
curious to notice that they regarded the business of life-
insurance? with much suspicion, as it seemed to be merely
speculative® and lent itself to all sorts of nefarious practices.
At a meeting of the subscribers, in March 1774, a resolution
was passed of which the preamble states that “ shameful
Practices have been introduced of late years into the business who
of Underwriting, such as making Speculative Insurances on ro =
the Lives of Persons and of Government securities.” It 237s In
continues that “in the first instance it is endangering the
Lives of the Persons so Insured, from the idea of being
selected by Society for that inhuman purpose, which is
being virtually an accessory in a species of slow murder.”
The subscribers were therefore to refuse to undertake such
business and to show “a proper resentment” against any
broker who attempted to introduce it’.
Tt thus came about that the underwriters, who had been
left outside when the two great Companies were formed in
1720, had practically formed themselves into a body re-
sembling a regulated Company. The forms under which
business was done were now definitely established ; but the
immense increase in the risks of loss which British shipping
ran, during the great wars®, rendered it necessary for all
1 Martin, Lloyd's, 157.
2 Martin, 117, quoting London Chronicle for 1768, also pamphlet entitled Every
Man His Own Broker. See also the Act regulating Life Insurance, 14 Geo.
[II. c. 48.
8 The valuation of Life Annuities had been already put on & geientific basis by
De Witt (whose treatise has been reprinted by Mr Hendriks in his excellent
monograph, Contributions to the History of Insurance, 40), and also by Halley,
Phil. Trams. XVII. 596, but they atiracted little attention among practical men.
Many actuarial questions are also discussed by Weyman Lee, An Essay to
ascertain the value of leases and annuities for years and lives, and to estimate the
chances of the duration of lives (1738). The Society for Equitable Assurances wag
the first Company founded on a scientific basis; this was established in 1762, but
the promoters failed fo procure a charter. E. J. Farren, Historical Essay on the
Rise and Early Progress of the doctrine of Life Contingencies (1844), p. 94. The
Amicable Society, which was incorporated in 1706, was originally a sort of
Tontine. Ib. p. 35. 4 Martin, Lloyd's, 157.
5 Compare Debates on Miscarriages of the Navy (1708), Parl. Hist. vi. 618:
4.09
