Page:A short history of social life in England.djvu/328

308 mechanical force was revealed in the discovery by which Watt transformed the steam engine from a mere toy into the most wonderful instrument which human industry has ever had at its command," Here was a new labour-saving machine, the crowning invention of an age which as yet had surpassed all others in ingenuity and that indomitable perseverance in the teeth of opposition which has ever been such a characteristic of our people.