An allegory of these things may be found in Dr. John Moore’s description of the army of Frederick the Great. Dr. Moore saw a man caned for being a few seconds late in replacing his ramrod; and the officers told him that, since they could not distinguish wilful blunders from accidental, they punished all alike, and the result, they said, was excellent; all the men were on the alert, and fewer blunders were committed on the whole. It used to be common on field-days for dragoons to have their hats blown off and to be thrown from their horses. At last a general gave orders to punish every man to whom either of these accidents happened; since then hardly anybody lost his hat or fell from his horse. Dr. Moore heard of a poor hussar who had fallen from his horse at last review, and was to be punished for it as soon as he could leave the hospital. This seemed hard, but the King of Prussia thought he could only hope to make his army superior to others by improving its discipline, training its officers by honour and disgrace, and its privates by physical punishment; he considered that the occasional suffering of an innocent individual does less harm to an army than the toleration of negligence, which makes the negligence greater.[713] So far as legal relief goes, Malthus would recommend the same martial severity, and try to put men on their guard against poverty by making them bear the discipline of its consequences. There are other points in which the allegory applies to the “simple system of natural liberty;” the discipline of industrial competition is certainly in some respects as severe as the discipline of an army. On the other hand, society does not consist of picked strong men, but includes the weak also, and its privates are supposed not to take their orders from a commander, but to “fend for themselves.” Society under socialism may resemble an army, but not society under individualism. Malthus, therefore, would have repudiated the analogy. He does not reach his conclusions by a preconceived theory of the state, but by observing the ill results of the common preconceived theory that every citizen when destitute has a right to be supported by the state. He finds that, as a matter of fact, where material relief has been given as a duty, and claimed as a right, the effect on the recipient has been clearly bad; the Poor Law stands condemned by experience.