“It has long appeared to me that the only true British policy was that which aimed at the good of the whole British Empire, not that which sought the advantage of one part in the disadvantage of the others; therefore all measures of procuring gain to the Mother Country arising from loss to her colonies, and all gain to the Colonies arising from or occasioning loss to Britain, especially where the gain was small and the loss was great ... I in my own mind condemned as improper, partial, unjust and mischievous, tending to create dissensions and weaken that union on which the strength, solidity and duration of the Empire greatly depended; and I opposed, as far as my little powers went, all proceedings, either here or in America, that in my opinion had such tendency.”
Priestley’s testimony is no less explicit. He says:—
“The unity of the British Empire in all its parts was a favourite idea of his. He used to compare it to a beautiful china vase which, if ever broken, could never be put together again, and so great an admirer was he of the British constitution that he said he saw no inconvenience from its being extended over a great part of the globe.”
In the autobiography we further read:—
“I can bear witness that he (Franklin) was so far from promoting, as was generally supposed, that he took every method in his power to prevent a rupture between the two countries. He urged so much the doctrine of forbearance, that for some time he was unpopular with the Americans on that account, as too much a friend to Great Britain. His advice to them was to bear everything for the present, as they were sure in time to outgrow all their grievances, as it could not be in the power of the Mother Country to oppress them long.
“He dreaded the war, and often said that if the difference should come to an open rupture it would be a war of ten years, and he should not live to see the end of it. In reality the war lasted nearly eight years, but he did not live to see the happy termination of it. That the issue would be favourable to America he never doubted. The English, he used to say, may take all our great towns, but that will not give them possession of the country. The last day that he spent in England, having given out that he should leave London the day before, we passed together without any other company; and much of the time was employed in reading American newspapers, especially accounts of the reception which the ‘Boston Port Bill’ met with in America; and as he read the addresses to the inhabitants of Boston from the places in the neighbourhood the tears trickled down his cheeks.”
What Franklin thought of Priestley may be gathered from the following extract from one of his letters to Vaughan, one of Priestley’s Warrington pupils, written in October 1788 after his return to America:—
“Remember me affectionately to the good Dr Price and to the honest heretic, Dr Priestley. I do not call him honest by way of distinction, for I think all the heretics I have known have been virtuous men. They have the virtue of fortitude, or they would not venture to own their heresy; and they cannot afford to be deficient in any of the other virtues, as that would give advantage to their many enemies; and they have not, like orthodox sinners, such a number of friends to excuse or justify them. Do not, however, mistake me. It is not to my good friend’s heresy that I impute his honesty. On the contrary ’tis his honesty that has brought upon him the character of heretic.”
In 1780, at the suggestion of his brother-in-law, John Wilkinson, one of his truest friends, Priestley was led to take up his residence in Birmingham. There were many circumstances which made this step desirable. In Birmingham he had friends prepared to welcome him and society in every way sympathetic and congenial. Moreover, he was desirous of resuming his ministerial duties, which had been intermitted for the past six or seven years, and an opportunity of doing so, with a congregation not less liberal than he had served at Leeds, offered itself, owing to the approaching retirement of Mr Hawkes from the charge of the New Meeting. As regards his philosophical pursuits he had the convenience of good workmen of every kind and he could count upon the practical sympathy and interest of men like Watt, his partner Boulton, Keir, Withering, Wedgwood, Erasmus Darwin, and the Galtons, all at that time living in Birmingham or in its vicinity. These men and their friends constituted indeed a cultured society without a parallel in any other town in the kingdom, except possibly in the Metropolis. The more eminent of them formed themselves into an association, to which frequent reference is made in the biographical literature of the period, on account of the part which it played in the social and intellectual life of the Midlands.
The Lunar Society of Birmingham appears to have been formed about the year 1766 by Matthew Boulton and Erasmus Darwin, at that time resident in Birmingham. The members were about ten or a dozen in number and met at each other’s houses for dinner once a month on the Monday nearest to the full moon, in order to have the benefit of its light in returning home. They were in the habit of sitting down to dinner at two o’clock and their meeting lasted until eight.
Each member was allowed to bring a friend, and thus it happened that many distinguished men were recipients, at various times, of the Club’s hospitality. Among them we find Wedgwood, Sir Joseph Banks, Sir William Herschel, Smeaton, the builder of the Eddystone Lighthouse; Dr Samuel Parr, the critic; Afzelius, the teacher of Berzelius; Solander, the well-known naturalist and traveller; De Luc and other names eminent in the literary and scientific annals of the century.