It would be neither complimentary nor true to ascribe the difference to the logic of sentiment; but it is true that the acute sensitiveness of Malthus to the evils of poverty kept constantly before him large classes of facts which Ricardo seemed willing to forget, and the path that he took, though long ago obscured and forgotten, led him in some important points away from _laissez faire_ to doctrines of our own day, in which society acting through its Government is allowed an originative and not merely a regulative action in the matter of industry and wealth. Resuming the thread of the essay, we shall find that the relation of society to its destitute poor is not to Malthus, as to Ricardo, a question of taxation and finance, but a problem of morals and politics, which could only be solved by a clear view of the relation of the citizen to the commonwealth. CHAPTER IV. THE BEGGAR. Arrangement of the Essay—Nature’s Mighty Feast—Tract on _High Price of Provisions_—I cannot, therefore I ought not—Poor Laws condemned—Frederick the Great’s Army—Mitigation of Bad Effects of Poor Law—Step towards Abolition—New Poor Law. In the foregoing brief review of the economical doctrines of Malthus, the chapters on commercial policy and the Corn Laws,[688] in the third book of the _Essay on Population_, have been already noticed. As the First and Second books of the essay were supposed to deal with the state of population in past and in present times, the Third is supposed to deal with the “different systems of expedients which have been proposed or have prevailed in society” for curing the evils arising from the principle of population, while the Fourth relates to the future prospects of society, and the possibility of removing the evils in question. This division of the subject could not be maintained very strictly. The “systems proposed” no doubt were in most cases mere theories and could be considered by themselves; but the “systems that prevailed” included such laws as the Corn Laws and Poor Laws, which directly affected the present habits and wealth of the people, and might fairly have been considered in the second book. The fourth book might quite logically have been part of the third, for it simply adds to the “systems proposed” the proposal of Malthus himself. The arrangement is not in itself so perfect or so closely respected by its author that we need have any remorse for disregarding it. The earliest chapters of the third book (i. and ii.) are substantially the refutation of Godwin, Wallace, Condorcet, as it appeared in 1798, with a postscript (ch. iii.) on Owen and Spence, which will be best considered in another place.[689] In point of style they are probably the best in the book.