, and is forced to put up in return
with a part of the produce of his labour.[439] The poor-laws recognise
the principle that those who get all from the labour of others should
provide from their superfluities for the necessities of those in
want.[440] The 'grinding necessity' of which Malthus had spoken does
not raise but lower the standard; and a system of equality would
lessen instead of increasing the pressure. Malthus, again, has
proposed that parents should be responsible for their children. That
is, says Hazlitt, Malthus would leave children to starvation, though
he professes to disapprove infanticide. He would 'extinguish every
spark of humanity ... towards the children of others' on pretence of
preserving the 'ties of parental affection.' Malthus tries to argue
that the 'iniquity of government' is not the cause of poverty. That
belief, he says, has generated discontent and revolution. That is,
says Hazlitt, the way to prevent revolutions and produce reforms is to
persuade people that all the evils which government may inflict are
their own fault. Government is to do as much mischief as it pleases,
without being answerable for it.[441] The poor-laws, as Hazlitt
admits, are bad, but do not show the root of the evil. The evils are
really due to increasing tyranny, dependence, indolence, and
unhappiness due to other causes. Pauperism has increased because the
government and the rich have had their way in everything. They have
squandered our revenues, multiplied sinecures and pensions, doubled
salaries, given monopolies and encouraged jobs, and depressed the poor
and industrious. The 'poor create their own fund,' and the necessity
for it has arisen from the exorbitant demands made by the rich.[442]
Malthus is a Blifil,[443] hypocritically insinuating arguments in
favour of tyranny under pretence of benevolence.

Hazlitt's writing, although showing the passions of a bitter partisan,
hits some of Malthus's rather cloudy argumentation. His successor,
Ensor, representing the same view, finds an appropriate topic in the
wrongs of Ireland. Irish poverty, he holds, is plainly due not to
over-population but to under-government,[444] meaning, we must
suppose, misgovernment. But the same cause explains other cases. The
'people are poor and are growing poorer,'[445] and there is no mystery
about it. The expense of a court, the waste of the profits and money
in the House of Commons, facts which are in striking contrast to the