Reaction
When Lord Bute became Prime Minister in 1762, he pushed for a resolution to the war with France and Spain, fearing that Great Britain could not govern all of its newly acquired territories. In what Winston Churchill would later term a policy of "appeasement," Bute returned many French and Spanish colonies. Despite a desire for peace, many in the British parliament opposed the return of hard-fought gains. Notable among the opposition was former Prime Minister William Pitt, the Elder, who warned that the terms of the treaty would only lead to further conflicts once France and Spain had time to rebuild. "The peace was insecure," he would later say, "because it restored the enemy to her former greatness. The peace was inadequate, because the places gained were no equivalent for the places surrendered." Members of Parliament known to oppose the treaty were dismissed from offices, until it was certain to pass. When the treaty was approved in Great Britain, it passed 319 votes to 65 opposed.
The Treaty of Paris took no consideration of Great Britain's battered continental ally, Frederick II of Prussia. Frederick would have to negotiate peace terms separately in the Treaty of Hubertusburg. For decades following the Seven Years' War, Frederick II would consider the Treaty of Paris as a British betrayal.
The American colonists were disappointed by the protection of Roman Catholicism in the Treaty of Paris because of their own strong Protestant faith. Some have pointed to this as one reason for the breakdown of American–British relations.
Read more about this topic: Treaty Of Paris (1763)
Famous quotes containing the word reaction:
“Sole and self-commanded works,
Fears not undermining days,
Grows by decays,
And, by the famous might that lurks
In reaction and recoil,
Makes flames to freeze, and ice to boil.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“In contrast to revenge, which is the natural, automatic reaction to transgression and which, because of the irreversibility of the action process can be expected and even calculated, the act of forgiving can never be predicted; it is the only reaction that acts in an unexpected way and thus retains, though being a reaction, something of the original character of action.”
—Hannah Arendt (1906–1975)
“Christianity was only a very strong and singularly well-timed Salvation Army movement that happened to receive help from an unusual and highly dramatic incident. It was a Puritan reaction in an age when, no doubt, a Puritan reaction was much wanted; but like all sudden violent reactions, it soon wanted reacting against.”
—Samuel Butler (1835–1902)