Mr. Herschel ... brought with him the calculations of the computers, and we commenced the tedious process of verification. After a time many discrepa… - Charles Babbage

ENGLAND has invited the civilized world to meet in its great commercial centre; asking it, in friendly rivalry, to display for the common advantage of all, those objects which each country derives from the gifts of nature, and on which it confers additional utility by processes of industrial art.
This invitation, universally accepted, will bring from every quarter a multitude of people greater than has yet assembled in any western city: these welcome visitors will enjoy more time and opportunity for observation than has ever been afforded on any previous occasion. The statesman and the philosopher, the manufacturer and the merchant, and all enlightened observers of human nature, may avail themselves of the opportunity afforded by their visit to this Diorama of the Peaceful Arts, for taking a more correct view of the industry, the science, the institutions, and the government of this country. One object of these pages is, to suggest to such inquirers the agency of those deeper seated and less obvious causes which can be detected only by lengthened observation, and to supply them with a key to explain many of the otherwise incomprehensible characteristics of England.

There remains a third source from which we arrive at the knowledge of the existence of a supreme Creator, namely, from an examination of his works. Unlike transmitted testimony, which is weakened at every stage, this evidence derives confirmation from the progress of the individual as well as from the advancement of the knowledge of the race. Almost all thinking men who have studied the laws which govern the animate and the inanimate world around us, agree that the belief in the existence of one Supreme Creator, possessed of infinite wisdom and power, is open to far less difficulties than the supposition of the absence of any cause, or of the existence of a plurality of causes.

In the making both of lace and of statues, the to the artists can only be reduced by producing a larger number of them through more extended education. The expense of the raw material is small in both. The expense of labour in lacemaking is very large, and it is perhaps considerable also in sculpture. The discovery of more convenient localities yielding marble, may make some diminution in its cost; and the improved manufacture of thread may slightly reduce the price of lace. A reduction in the price of labour may to a very moderate extent reduce the cost of the raw material of both. But it is evident that any very great reduction is not to be expected.
Let us now contrast this possible reduction with the past history of some industrial art. The plain made at , called patent net, will supply us with a good example. In the year 1813 that lace was sold in the piece at the rate of 218. a-yard. At the present time lace of the same kind, but of a better quality, is sold under the same circumstances at 3d. per yard. Thus, in less than forty years the price of the industrial produce has diminished to one eighty-fourth part of its original price.