Sec. 15] CAPITAL ACCOUNTS 89 
expectations of the future are changed and confused. 
Plans are given up, orders are countermanded, and trade 
is stopped. Assets, representing as they do the value of 
future expectations, suffer sudden and heavy reductions. 
§ 15 
Briefly summarizing this chapter we may say that a per- 
son who has liabilities is, in a sense, a trustee. He holds 
more than he owns. He holds all his assets; he owns 
only the margin between these and his liabilities. His 
responsibility for the liabilities requires that he should 
keep his own margin of capital comparatively safe. But 
there is always risk of losing his margin and becoming 
insolvent. This risk, whether large or small, is necessarily 
assumed by his creditors, and its existence should be 
recognized in law as well as in business practice. The 
record of the relations which at any time exist between 
assets, liabilities, and the margin of capital separating 
them constitutes what we have called the “capital ac- 
counts.”