Page:On the economy of machinery and manufactures - Babbage - 1846.djvu/50

16 the invention of a person suffering under that calamity. Other examples might be mentioned of contrivances for the use, the amusement, or the instruction of the wealthier classes, who labour under the same natural disadvantages. These triumphs of skill and ingenuity deserve a double portion of our admiration when applied to mitigate the severity of natural or accidental misfortune; when they supply the rich with occupation and knowledge; when they relieve the poor from the additional evils of poverty and want.

(15.) Division of the objects of machinery. There exists a natural, although, in point of number, a very unequal division amongst machines: they may be classed as; 1st. Those which are employed to produce power; and as, 2''dly. Those which are intended merely to transmit force and execute work''. The first of these divisions is of great importance, and is very limited in the variety of its species, although some of those species consist of numerous individuals.

Of that class of mechanical agents by which motion is transmitted,—the lever, the pulley, the wedge, and many others,—it has been demonstrated, that no power is gained by their use, however combined. Whatever force is applied at one point can only be exerted at some other, diminished by friction and other incidental causes; and it has been further proved, that whatever is gained in the rapidity of execution is compensated by the necessity of exerting additional force. These two principles, long since placed beyond the reach of doubt, cannot be too constantly borne in mind. But in limiting our attempts to things which are possible, we are still, as we hope to shew, possessed of a field of inexhaustible research, and of