The
introduction of punched cards crystallized Babbage's feeling
that he had invented something really new, something more
than just a sophisticated calculating machine.
He wrote in his notebook on July 10, 1836, "This
day I had for the first time a general but very distinct
conception of the possibility of making an engine work
out of algebraic development." Babbage had a paper
completed the invention of what is today "the general
purpose digital computer."
Few
people understood Babbage's work or realized its significance.