The animosity and excitement which attended this contest was of course extreme, and the character and the whole political course of Franklin, were assailed by his enemies with all the violence and pertinacity that characterize political contests of this kind at the present day. Franklin, however, bore it all very good-naturedly. Just before he sailed, after he had left Philadelphia to repair to the ship, which was lying some distance down the river, he wrote a very affectionate letter to his daughter to bid her farewell and give her his parting counsels. “You know,” said he, in this letter, “that I have many enemies, all, indeed, on the public account (for I can not recollect that I have in a private capacity given just cause of offense to any one whatever), yet they are enemies, and very bitter ones; and you must expect their enmity will extend in some degree to you, so that your slightest indiscretions will be magnified into crimes, in order the more sensibly to wound and afflict me. It is, therefore, the more necessary for you to be extremely circumspect in all your behavior, that no advantage may be given to their malevolence.” Then followed various counsels relating to her duty to her mother, her general deportment, her studies, and her obligations to the church. The church with which Franklin was connected was of the Episcopal denomination, and he took a great interest in its prosperity; though he manifested the same liberality and public spirit here as in all the other relations that he sustained. At one time, for example, it was proposed by certain members of the congregation to form a sort of colony, and build a new church in another place. A portion of the people opposed this plan as tending to weaken the mother church, but Franklin favored it, thinking that in the end the measure would have a contrary effect from the one they apprehended. He compared it to the swarming of bees, by which, he said, the comfort and prosperity of the old hive was increased, and a new and flourishing colony established to keep the parent stock in countenance. Very few persons, at that period, would have seen either the expediency or the duty of pursuing such a course in respect to the colonization of a portion of a church: though now such views are very extensively entertained by all liberal minded men, and many such colonies are now formed from thriving churches, with the concurrence of all concerned.
But to return to the voyage. Franklin was to embark on board his ship at Chester, a port situated down the river from Philadelphia, on the confines of the State of Delaware. A cavalcade of three hundred people from Philadelphia accompanied him to Chester, and a great company assembled upon the wharf, when the vessel was about to sail, to take leave of their distinguished countryman and wish him a prosperous voyage. The crowd thus assembled saluted Franklin with acclamations and cheers, as the boat which was to convey him to the vessel slowly moved away from the shore. The day of his sailing was the 7th of November, 1764, about two years after his return from his former visit.
The voyage across the Atlantic was a prosperous one, notwithstanding that it was so late in the season. Franklin wrote a letter home to give his wife and daughter an account of his voyage, before he left the vessel. On landing he proceeded to London, and went directly to his old landlady's, at Mrs. Stevenson's, in Craven-street, Strand. When the news of his safe arrival reached Philadelphia, the people of the city celebrated the event by ringing the bells, and other modes of public rejoicing. The hostility which had been manifested toward him had operated to make him a greater favorite than ever.
Franklin now began to turn his attention toward the business of his agency. He had not been long in England, however, before difficulties grew up between the colonies and the mother country, which proved to be of a far more serious character than those which had been discussed at Philadelphia. Parliament claimed the right to tax the colonies. The colonies maintained that their own legislatures alone had this right, and a long and obstinate dispute ensued. The English government devised all sorts of expedients to assess the taxes in such a way that the Americans should be compelled to pay them; and the Americans on their part met these attempts by equally ingenious and far more effectual contrivances for evading the payment. For a time the Americans refused to use any British commodities, in order that the people of England might see that by the persisting of the government in their determination to tax the colonies, they would lose a very valuable trade. Franklin joined in this effort, insomuch that for a long time he would not make purchases in England of any articles to send home to his family. At length the difficulty was in some measure compromised. One of the most obnoxious of the acts of Parliament for taxing America was repealed, and then for the first time Franklin purchased and sent home to his wife and daughter quite a trunk full of dresses—silks, satins, and brocade—with gloves, and bottles of lavender water, and other such niceties to fill the corners. He told her, in the letter which he sent with this trunk, that, as the Stamp Act was repealed, he was now willing that she should have a new gown.
In fact the great philosopher's attention was attracted at this time in some degree to the effect of dress upon his own personal appearance, for on making a visit to Paris, which he did toward the close of 1767, he says that the French tailor and perruquier so transformed him as to make him appear twenty years younger than he really was.
Franklin received a great deal of attention while he was in Paris, and he seems to have enjoyed his visit there very highly. The most distinguished men in the walks of literature and science sought his society, for they all knew well his reputation as a philosopher; and many of them had read his writings and had repeated the experiments which he had made, and which had awakened so deep an interest throughout the whole learned world. Franklin received too, many marks of distinction and honor from the public men of France—especially from those who were connected with the government. It was supposed that they had been watching the progress of the disputes between England and her colonies, and secretly hoping that these disputes might end in an open rupture; for such a rupture they thought would end in weakening the power of their ancient rival. Sympathizing thus with the party in this contest which Franklin represented, they naturally felt a special interest in him. Franklin was presented at court, and received into the most distinguished society in the metropolis.