Note 204 — Chapter IX · ToC
Reading edition
Op. cit., p. 82. Babbage, in laying stress on one of the "advantages" of machinery, makes an ingenuous admission of this "forcing" power. "One of the most singular advantages we derive from machinery is the check it affords against the inattention, the idleness, or the knavery of human agents." (Economy of Machinery, p. 39; cf. also Ure, Philosophy of Manufactures, p. 30.)