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The word is used in an 1834 treatise on the potential power of Charles Babbage's Difference Engine.

Mr Babbage's invention puts an engine in the place of the computer; the question is set to the instrument, or the instrument is set to the question, and by simply giving it motion the solution is wrought, and a string of answers is exhibited.

While this may not be quite the answer asked for, its usage in a related sense at the beginning of computing history could mean that looking for a strictly constrained definition of a term that conveys much of its original non-computing meaning in the contemporary syntactical usage may be an interesting but ultimately indeterminate exercise.