Godwin himself was not conscious of his change of front; as the seventh of thirteen children he may have thought the matter personal; and whatever concessions he had made in 1801 he withdrew in 1820. In that year, with David Booth, the patient author of the _English Analytical Dictionary_, to arrange his statistics and vouch for his calculations, he published an elaborate reply to the _Essay on Population_. The politicians, the political economists, the bulk of the press, and the public had accepted the Malthusian doctrines, though the conversion of the public was no deeper than it was on Free Trade, and the statesmen with a few exceptions were not sorry to make capital out of the “odiousness” of the doctrines whenever the “acknowledged truth” of them would not serve their turn. Still it seemed true that time had declared for Malthus, and Godwin had fallen out of notice. Sydney Smith’s assertion,[830] “Malthus took the trouble of refuting him, and we hear no more of Mr. Godwin,” is not very far from the truth. Malthus had survived his refutation, and Godwin his reputation. Pitt, Paley, and Copleston were with Malthus; he had gained over Hallam among historians, James Mill, Senior, and Ricardo among economists, Brougham, Mackintosh, and even Whitbread among politicians. Southey, Hazlitt, and Cobbett were not a sufficient make-weight. Hazlitt in his _Reply_ to the _Essay on Population_ (in letters of which some appeared in Cobbett’s _Pol. Register_, 1807) acknowledges the popularity, though he predicts its decay.[831] It seems clear that in educated circles at least the view of Malthus was as early as 1820 what it was in 1829, “the popular view,”[832] which is quite compatible, as Darwin long experienced, with great unpopularity in particular quarters. No better evidence could be given of this popularity than the unwilling testimony given by Godwin himself in his new book.[833] At the end of 1819 Brougham had referred in the House of Commons to the principle of Malthus as “one of the soundest principles of political economy,” and said it was melancholy to observe how the press scouted it and abused its defenders.[834] The press, however, was divided. The _Edinburgh Review_ from the first had sided with Malthus. The _Quarterly_ had begun by strong hostility (Dec. 1812, pp. 320 _seq._); had softened its tone as time went on (Dec. 1813, pp. 157 _seq._, and Oct. 1814, pp. 154–5); had spoken with hesitation and doubtfulness (Oct. 1816, pp. 50 _seq._); and had at last completely surrendered (July 1817, pp. 369 _seq._), confessing it to be “much easier to disbelieve Mr. Malthus than to refute him” (p. 396), thereafter utilizing his doctrine for the support of things as they are, only regretting that Malthus himself would not do the same a little more stoutly (pp. 402–3). Finally, as we have seen, Malthus, after having contributed to the _Edinburgh_, became a contributor to the _Quarterly_.