The question of Poor Law administration has been treated here in some detail, for there is a possibility in this matter of some practical reform. We have therefore given a prominence in this work to considerations connected with the poor law, and can deal only in a cursory manner with other forms of State socialism, which though perhaps equally important are not yet ripe for curtailment and removal.

The advocates of the abolition of out-door relief urge that the proper alternative is to be found in the principle of insurance. Of all the modern expedients for the distribution of property and for giving to poor men the security of civilised life, insurance is perhaps the most ingenious and the most valuable. The principle of insurance has been widely applied, and it is capable of much wider extension. There is hardly any risk which is incapable of being insured. The professional classes are admirably served by commercial enterprise, and their wants are in this way adequately met.

In America life insurance is the principal form of saving. It has been less extensively used on the continent of Europe, perhaps for the reason that there is a wider distribution of landed property and because savings are invested in land rather than in insurance. In France, however, it is curious to note, the French peasant has insured his crops against damage by storm, a risk which is proverbially the most uncertain of all things.