On two occasions I have been asked, – "Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?" In one case a member of the Upper, and in the other a member of the Lower, House put this question. I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question.

Propose to any englishman any principle, or any instrument, however admirable, and you will observe that the whole effort of the english mind is directed to find a difficulty, defect or an impossibility in it.