SELF DESTRUCTION OF INSURED   465

of the "Society for Equitable Assurances upon Lives" and of the "Crown Life Assurance Company" contain the same form of expression as that employed in the policy in question; (Ellis on Ins. 230, 2340 and Mr. Ellis refers to the phraseology as importing the usual condition to be found in all policies, though a majority of them probably use the word suicide. * * *

The connection in which the words stand in the policy would seem to indicate that they were intended to express a criminal act of self-destruction; as they are found in conjunction with the pro-vision relating to the termination of the life of the insured in a duel, or by his execution as a criminal. This association may well characterise and aid in determining the somewhat indefinite and equivocal import of the phrase. Speaking legally also, (and the policy should be subjected to this test,) self-destruction by a fellow-being bereft of reason, can with no more propriety be ascribed to the act of his own hand, than to the deadly instrument that may have been used for the purpose. The drowning of Comfort was no more his act, in the sense of the law, than if he had been impelled by irresistible physical power; nor is there any greater reason for exempting the company from the risk assumed in the policy, than if his death had been occasioned by such means. Construing these words, therefore, according to their true, and, as I apprehend, universally received meaning among insurance offices, there can be no doubt that the termination of Comfort's life was not within the saving clause of the policy. Suicide involves the deliberate termination of one's existence, while in the possession and enjoyment of his mental faculties. Self-slaughter by an insane man or a lunatic is not an act of suicide within the meaning of the law. (4 B1. Corn. 189. 1 Hale's I'1. C. 411, 412.) I am of opinion, therefore, that the plaintiffs are entitled to judgment on the demurrer.

Ordered accordingly.'

7 Affirmed: (1853) 8 N. Y. 299, 59 Am. Dec. 482.

Accord: Central Mut. Life Ins. Assn. v. Anderson (1902) 195 Ill. 135, 62 N. E. 838; Connecticut Mut. Life Ins. Co. v. Akens (1893) 150 U. S. 468, 37 L. ed. 1148, 14 Sup. Ct. 155; Manhattan Life Ins. Co. v. Broughton (1885) 109 U. S. 121, 27 L. ed. 878, 3 Sup. Ct. 99; Mutual Life v. Walden (1894, Tex.) 26 S. W. 1012 (the insured warranted that he would not kill himself) ; Life Ins. Co. v. Terry (1872) 15 Wall. (82 U. S.) 580, 21 L. ed. 236, where the court said "We hold the rule on the question before us to be this: If the assured, being in the possession of his ordinary reasoning faculties, from anger, pride, jealousy, or a desire to escape from the ills of life, intentionally takes his own life, the proviso attaches, and there can be no recovery. If the death is caused by the voluntary act of the assured, he knowing and intending that his death shall be the result of his act, but when his reasoning faculties are so far impaired that he is not able to understand the moral character, the general nature, consequences, and effect of the act he is about to commit, or when he is impelled thereto by an in-sane impulse, whieh he has not the power to resist, such death is not within the contemplation of the parties to the contract, and the insurer is liable."

See further the Note (1910) 23 Harv. L. Rev. 557.