The most fundamental general rule with regard to damages is that requiring certainty. The rule on this point has been well stated as follows: "Damages must be certain; both in their nature and in respect to the cause from which they proceed. Hypothetical or speculative damages are not recoverable."5

The cardinal principle in relation to the damages to be compensated for on the breach of a contract is that the plaintiff must establish the quantum of his loss, by evidence from which the jury will be able to estimate the extent of his injury, and will exclude all such elements of injury as are incapable of being ascertained by the usual rules of evidence to a reasonable degree of certainty.6

It is not, however, a sufficient reason for disallowing damages claimed that a party can state their amount only proximately, it is enough if from proximate estimates of witnesses a satisfactory conclusion can be reached.7

5 Sedgwick on Damages, p. 26.

6 Wolcott vs. Mount, 36 N. J. L., 262, 13 Am. St. Rep., 438.

7 13 Cyc., 37. Satchwell vs. Wil-liams, 40 Conn., 371. In Duke vs. Missouri Pac. R. Co., 99 Mo., 347, 351, 12 S. W., 636, the Court said: "Where there is no evidence showing the amount, or the proximate amount of expenses incurred for medicines, medical attention or like services, the jury have no basis upon which to form an estimate of the damages that ought to be assessed on account thereof, and damages of this kind cannot be found except upon such proof." Eckerd vs. Chicago, etc., R. Co., 70 Iowa, 353, 30 N. W., 615; Reed vs. Chicago, etc., R. Co., 57 Iowa, 23,10 N. W., 285; Crowley vs. St. Louis, etc., R. Co., 24 Mo. App., 119; vs.

Redf. on Neg. (4th Ed.), Sec. 759. "Where compensatory damages only are given, the recovery must be confined to the actual damages sustained." Hannibal Bridge Co. vs. Schanbacker, 57 Mo., 582. "And when such damages are susceptible of proof with approximate accuracy, and may be measured with some degree of certainty, they should not be left to the guess of the jury, even in actions ex delicto." Parsons vs. Missouri Pac. R. Co., 94 Mo., 286, 6 S. W., 464; Pritchard vs. Hewitt, 91 Mo., 547, 4 S. W., 437, 60 Am. Rep., 265. The question of certainty of damages will be touched upon to a very considerable extent in each of the remaining chapters on the subject of Damages.

Next in importance to the rule as to certainty of damages comes the rule as to proximate cause. Damages can be recovered only from those injuries which are the proximate result of the act which is the basis of the action. Damages which are the remote result of such act cannot be recovered for.8