590: Life Insurance.— The Duelling Clause in Policiés. [Dec. 
find a great many other expedients, if he were determined to,.take bis, . 
departure from this nether world, by which he might 0 depart; and no: 
proofbe given against him of wilful and. prepense desertion. |). 24) ¢..), 
| The second ‘ofthese three clauses—that against death by ‘the, hands. 
of justice—it\ is hardly necessary to say any thing upon. .Except.per-, 
haps, that—in this case, as in the last—I think the) Assurance,Company 
takes nothing—ornext to nothing—by its motion. Because the people. | 
who are hanged are not of that class who ¢nsure their loves: they are, | 
commonly of a kind too poor for such a precaution, besides, being too. | 
careless, or too desperate. I shall by-and-bye in a very short .word— : 
dispose of the possibly assumed position— that ether of these two provisions | 
save any thing worth consideration to an Assurance Company :, but, the . 
only regulation worth talking about—and that which I am. seriously 
anxious to repeal—is the last of the three rules which has been mentioned 
—the clause which defeats payment of a man’s (personal) policy,,in case. 
of death by Duelling. ost bit 
I know here that I shall be met, at once, with a'tirade about, ‘* mo- 
rality;” but I am prepared to let that storm spend its force upon,me— 
and then go on. I no more mean to defend duelling—as a practice— 
than I would defend the excessive drinking of wine, or the inordinate eating 
of turtle as a practice; but, if I could hit upon a mode of avoiding the head- 
ache, or the indigestion consequent upon the indulgence of either of 
those habits, I should hardly deserve to be taxed as an offender against 
morality if I promulgated it. 
This fact I take to be certain—within a given limit, duelling is a 
practice which never can be prevented. I do not know whether it, would 
be very advantageous—as far as human foresight can reach—if it could 
be prevented; but I do not enter into that question—while we remain 
the people that we are—it certainly will not. voy-noit 
The experiment of severe penalties against duelling was tried. i 
France ; and in an age when the principles of penalties could be tried 
as it never now can be tried again. In the beginning of the. sixteenth 
century, under Henry IV. (of France), the laws against’ duelling were 
of the most sanguinary nature; the executions of the most. horrible 
description—and they totally failed. First, they were evaded .by..the 
simulation of sudden quarrels; and the combats, less openly, and coo 
conducted, became more furious and less fair. When this pretence woul 
serve no longer, men who met death for honour in. the field, did not 
shrink from it-on the scaffold; and after beheadings, hangings, confis- 
cations, banishments, the sacrifice of lives, and the beggaring of help- 
less, unoffending families—acts of grace were found indispensable ; and 
the laws fell into disuse, or were repealed. olny 
Our question here, however, is upon this dan, which is against the duel- 
list’ in all contracts executed with reference to Life Insurance. A Duel 
I take to be neither more nor less than a casualty in life, which nine men out 
often—and those, the honest, the cautious, the feeling, and the respectable 
nine—must always regret — but to which nevertheless every feeling man 
in society, above a certain rank, accounts himself, upon occasion, rigid 
subject; and, looking merely to the trade of Insurance, is it not a mischie- 
vous arrangementfor the dealers on both sides—both forthe assurers and 
the assured—that that very provision should be rendered, subject. to,a 
casualty, which a man only thinks it worth while to make,, because. it 
relieves him from the effect of caswalty altogether? My ‘firm: )belief. is 
