TEE LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY 381 



THE LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY AS A DYNAMIC IN THE 

 MOVEMENT FOR PHYSICAL WELFARE 



By EUGENE LYMAN FISK, M.D. 



MEDICAL DIRECTOR, POSTAL LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY, NEW YORK 



THE average careless liver, although he may be perfectly willing to 

 swallow some "magic" elixir, exhibits uneasiness tinged with 

 suspicion when approached on the subject of prolonging his life by 

 means of adjusting him to his environment. He is more than likely to 

 regard the span of life as fixed by some immutable, if not divine, law, 

 and while comfortably optimistic about attaining the limit fixed by 

 such law, cherishes but little hope of "beating the game." In other 

 words, that convenient individual, the " man on the street," is sceptical 

 about materially prolonging his life without surrendering some of the 

 indulgences which he thinks make life worth living. It is this attitude 

 of mind which leads him frequently to characterize the health-reformer 

 as a "kill-joy," who is "against everything." Now it is unquestionably 

 true that the health-conservation activities that have lately arisen in a 

 few of the leading life-insurance companies have for their business ob- 

 ject a mere mathematical increment to the years of life. Indeed, the 

 only legal warrant for the expenditure of the policyholders' money in 

 this work is the probability of attaining such a result, and thereby low- 

 ering the cost of insurance. But it is far from the minds of those di- 

 recting this new force for human betterment, to advocate a mere nig- 

 gardly or parsimonious hoarding of existence, without regard to its qual- 

 ity, color or meaning. The real warfare is against needless misery, pre- 

 ventable disease, mental and physical inefficiency, and the pitiable 

 handicaps that not only shorten life, but take out of it the color and 

 the satisfaction that make it worth living. Using the term in no sin- 

 ister Nietzschean sense, the superman should not only live long, but live 

 well, deriving his joy in life from the normal hormones circulating in 

 his tissues, and not from the fleshpots or narcotic indulgences of our 

 friend the careless liver. The prolongation of life is the end that justi- 

 fies the financial expenditure, but the immediate work in hand is to 

 make life more livable. 



Let it be understood, then, that the health-conservationist who is not 

 himself in need of mental hygiene is "against" many things, in favor 

 of many things, and out to kill only the kind of " joy " that kills. 



The belief that the death-rate, especially among selected insured 

 lives, is a fixed quantity, is still held by many experienced insurance 



