1. Book-keeping by Double Entry is now universally admitted to be the only complete and satisfactory system, and its general principles have been shown to be adapted to all kinds of commercial or public accounts. The work of the accountant in arranging a special system adapted to the purposes of a Life Assurance Office, is therefore principally confined to fixing the number and forms of the subsidiary books which serve either to receive the original entries of transactions, or to relieve the Principal Ledger of the particulars of individual accounts.

In Life Assurance Book-keeping, as in that of Mercantile Houses, Banks, or Government Departments, these subsidiary books must be specially adapted to the various classes of transactions or other financial facts which occur in the business. I have therefore found it convenient to deal with the subject of Life Assurance Book-keeping by considering in succession the various classes of financial facts that fall to be recorded in conducting the business, and in the case of each class, describing the books required for receiving the original entries, and the subsequent progress of these entries through the books.