Abstract
Recent historians, most notably Maxine Berg and Larry Stewart, have highlighted the importance but also ambiguity over the reception of the machine in late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth century England. This essay is concerned with a mode of reason developed in studies of machines and human power, and its application within specific spheres during this period. In particular, it focuses on certain sites of manufacture at the vanguard of industry, the machine's role in forging a distinctive view of intelligence, and, lastly, the impact of the machine upon developments within the state's system of prison punishment. For some commentators the machine was a symbol of progress and potential human emancipation, but for numerous others the mechanical heart that lay at the core of enlightenment libertarianism had degenerated into an enslaving project.
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