he can really afford it to make a collection of hopeful securities for himself, always remembering that there is no hope without risk, and that anyone is an ass who invests in possibilities, while forgetting that one of the possibilities is loss.
By this method the investor begins with the safety pedal hard down, and keeps it so until he is sure that he is able to afford adventure, after which the pressure on it may gradually be relaxed until, when his financial buckler is stout enough to blunt the edge of fortune's arrows, he can transfer the emphasis to adventure and indulge in the luxury of investing in enterprises of "great pith and moment" which, while full of glittering lure, must frankly be recognized as quite likely to disappoint their supporters.
In order that this method may be pursued the investor must grasp firmly the difference between the position of a creditor and that of a proprietor. Investment was described at the outset as the process by which we hand over money to somebody else, but the terms on which we hand it over make a great deal of difference. When we insure our lives we hand over money periodically in return for a promise to pay an agreed sum, with or without additions by way of bonus, on our death or at a certain date. When we invest in the more usual sense
