As to the library at Birmingham, he eventually succeeded in giving to it, as Hutton says, “that stability and method without which no institution can prosper.” We are further told that “the Society are under many and great obligations to the learned Doctor; it was him who altered its original plan and put it on a more extensive scale; he amended and enlarged the laws and has paid a great attention to its welfare and growing interests.”
Priestley’s action, and more especially the catholicity he displayed in the selection and admission of such books as in his judgment tended to the spread of rationalism, whether in religion or in politics, drew down upon him the wrath of the Court party, and more particularly of the beneficed clergy of the town and district, and the library was vigorously denounced as “a fountain of erroneous opinions, spreading infidelity, heresy and schism through the whole neighbourhood.”
This catholicity is reflected in almost every circumstance of his daily life.
“If liberality of sentiment,” he wrote on one occasion, “be the result of general and various acquaintance, few men now living have had a better opportunity of acquiring it than myself. This has arisen from the great variety of my pursuits, which has naturally brought me acquainted with persons of all principles and characters. One day, I remember, I dined in company with an eminent popish priest; the evening I spent with philosophers, determined unbelievers; the next morning I breakfasted, at his own request, with a most zealously orthodox clergyman, Mr Toplady, and the rest of that day I spent with Dr Jebb, Mr Lindsey and some others, men in all respects after my own heart. I have since enriched my acquaintance with that of some very intelligent Jews; and my opponents, who consider me already as half a Mahometan, will not suppose that I can have any objection to the society of persons of that religion.”
Dr Samuel Parr, the Prebend of St Paul’s, a staunch friend and true admirer of Priestley, who wrote the inscription on the tablet to his memory in the New Meeting House at Birmingham, related the following characteristic anecdote to Mrs Robert A. Wainwright, who died in 1891, in her 84th year:—
“Now remember this. I knew your grandfather, Dr Priestley. He once invited me to dinner at Fair Hill, and I never was at a more agreeable party in my life. Your grandfather was at the head of the table. I sat at the bottom. At your grandfather’s right hand was Mr Berington, the Roman Catholic, and Mr Galton, the Quaker, on his left. Next to me was Robert Robinson, the Baptist, and Mr Proud, minister of the New Jerusalem Church.”
All the five guests were remarkable men and distinguished in their several Churches. Dr Parr, one of the most erudite scholars of his time and an acute critic, an inveterate Whig, and a political ally of Fox, Burke and North, was Vicar of Wadenhoe in Northamptonshire, although he resided, as assistant curate, at Hatton, near Warwick, where he had an excellent library. Berington wrote a Literary History of the Middle Ages, and the History of Abelard and Heloise. Robert Robinson, of Cambridge, was the author of the History of Baptism, Ecclesiastical Researches, Village Sermons and other books. The Swedenborgian minister was the chief defender of the New Jerusalem Church in England, and was engaged in controversy with Priestley.
A contemporary account of Priestley at this period of his life describes him as about the middle stature, or five feet eight inches high; slender and well proportioned; of fair complexion, eyes grey and sparkling with intelligence, and his whole countenance expressive of the benignity of his heart. He often smiled, but seldom laughed. He was extremely active and agile in his motions; he walked fast and very erect, and his deportment was dignified. His usual dress was a black coat without a cape, a fine linen or cambric stock, a cocked hat, a powdered wig, shoes and buckles. He commonly walked with a long cane in his right hand, and was an excellent pedestrian. “The whole of his dress was remarkably clean, and this purity of person and simple dignity of manners evinced that philosophic propriety which prevailed throughout his conduct as a private individual.”
He rose about six o’clock and commonly retired to his study, where he continued until eight, when he met his family at breakfast. He breakfasted on tea, and after breakfast again went to his study, accompanied by his amanuensis. He often devoted the whole of his morning to composition, or divided his morning between the study and the laboratory. When engaged in experimental work he commonly wore a white apron and canvas covers drawn over his sleeves. He dined at one o’clock and was very abstemious. He seldom drank wine or beer. In the afternoon he usually took a walk, frequently to Birmingham, and spent some time at the office where his works were being printed. He supped at eight, the meal usually consisting of vegetables, and retired to rest shortly after ten. He was extremely methodical in his habits and a rigid economist of time.
At Daventry he began the practice, which he continued up to within three or four days of his death, of keeping, in Peter Annet’s system of shorthand, a diary in which he noted where he had been, the nature of his employment, what he had been reading, and any hints or suggestions of future work which had occurred to him, when he rose and the hour at which he went to bed. He was very methodical in his reading and in the alternation of his studies and relaxation. He never read a book without determining in his own mind when he would finish it. Had he a work to transcribe, he would fix a time for its completion. At the beginning of each year he arranged the plan he intended to pursue, and at the close he reviewed the general situation of his affairs and took stock of the progress he had made, noting whether the execution of his plan exceeded or fell short of his expectations. It was this regular apportionment of his time, and the habits of method and order in the arrangement of his business which he adopted in early life, and from which he never materially deviated, together with his uniformly good health, his industry and aptitude for rapid work, which enabled him to achieve what he did. It was, he says, a great advantage to him that he never was under the necessity of retiring from company in order to compose anything. Being fond of domestic life he got a habit of writing on any subject by the parlour fire with his wife and children about him, and occasionally talking to them without experiencing any inconvenience from such interruptions. When he was a young author (although he did not publish anything until he was about thirty) strictures on his writings gave him some disturbance, though he believed even then less than they do most others; but after some time things of that kind hardly affected him at all, and on this account he thinks he may be said to have been well formed for public controversy. But what always made him easy in any controversy in which he was engaged was his fixed resolution frankly to acknowledge any mistake that he might perceive he had fallen into. “That I had never been in the least backward to do this in matters of philosophy can never be denied.”