No motion impressed by natural causes, or by human agency, is ever obliterated. - Allan G Bromley

Propose to an 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, a defect, or an impossibility in it. If you speak to him of a machine for peeling a potato, he will pronounce it impossible: if you peel a potato with it before his eyes, he will declare it useless, because it will not slice a pineapple.

gently expressed a doubt whether the plan was possible, to which I replied that, not being able to prove its impossibility, I should follow out a slight glimmering of light which I thought I perceived.

Em duas ocasiões me perguntaram: 'Diga-nos, Sr. Babbage, se introduzirmos dados errados na máquina, ainda sairão respostas corretas?' Eu não consigo compreender o tipo de confusão de ideias que motivou tal questão.