is conscious
about his wants, and the engine (beyond refusing to work) does not seem
to be so; but this is temporary, and has been dealt with above.

"Accordingly, the requisite strength being given to the motives that are
to drive the driver, there has never, or hardly ever, been an instance of
a man stopping his engine through wantonness. But such a case might
occur; yes, and it might occur that the engine should break down: but if
the train is stopped from some trivial motive it will be found either
that the strength of the necessary influences has been miscalculated, or
that the man has been miscalculated, in the same way as an engine may
break down from an unsuspected flaw; but even in such a case there will
have been no spontaneity; the action will have had its true parental
causes: spontaneity is only a term for man's ignorance of the gods.

"Is there, then, no spontaneity on the part of those who drive the
driver?"

Here followed an obscure argument upon this subject, which I have thought
it best to omit. The writer resumes:--"After all then it comes to this,
that the difference between the life of a man and that of a machine is
one rather of degree than of kind, though differences in kind are not
wanting. An animal has more provision for emergency than a machine. The
machine is less versatile; its range of action is narrow; its strength
and accuracy in its own sphere are superhuman, but it shows badly in a
dilemma; sometimes when its normal action is disturbed, it will lose its
head, and go from bad to worse like a lunatic in a raging frenzy: but
here, again, we are met by the same consideration as before, namely, that
the machines are still in their infancy; they are mere skeletons without
muscles and flesh.

"For how many emergencies is an oyster adapted? For as many as are
likely to happen to it, and no more. So are the machines; and so is man
himself. The list of casualties that daily occur to man through his want
of adaptability is probably as great as that occurring to the machines;
and every day gives them some greater provision for the unforeseen. Let
any one examine the wonderful self-regulating and self-adjusting
contrivances which are now incorporated with the vapour-engine, let him
watch the way in which it supplies itself with oil; in which it indicates
its wants to those who tend it; in which, by the governor, it regulates
its application of its own strength; let him look at that store