- Sir William Temple, 1st Baronet
Sir William Temple, 1st Baronet (
25 April 1628 –27 January 1699 ),statesman andessayist , son of Sir John Temple.Born in
London , and educated atEmmanuel College, Cambridge , he travelled acrossEurope , and was for some time a member of theIrish Parliament , employed on various diplomatic missions. During his time as a diplomat, Temple successfully negotiated the marriage of the Prince of Orange and Princess Mary of England, and theTriple Alliance of 1668 . On his return he was much consulted by Charles II, but disapproving of the anti-Dutch courses adopted, retired to his house atSheen .He was called out of retirement to implement a plan of his design to reform government rule. He was the architect of the
Privy Council Ministry , which, though it failed, was an early effort to establish an executive along the lines of what later came to be understood as Cabinet government.Temple later left Sheen and purchased Compton Hall,
Farnham . He renamed the house Moor Park after Moor Park, Hertfordshire, a house he much admired and which influenced the formal gardens he built at Farnham. HereJonathan Swift was for a time his secretary. Temple installed his family motto "God has given us these opportunities for tranquility" above the door and took great pleasure from this house in his retirement from public life.He took no part in the
Glorious Revolution , but acquiesced to the new regime, and was offered, but refused, a role asSecretary of State .Temple married
Dorothy Osborne in 1655.His literary works consist for the most part of short essays, which were collected under the title "
Miscellanea ". However, he did write some longer pieces such as "", and "Essay on the Original and Nature of Government ".Temple died in
Moor Park ,Surrey ,England in 1699.External links
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* [http://essays.quotidiana.org/temple/ Essays by Temple on Quotidiana.org]References
Sir William Temple, "Observations upon the United Provinces of the Netherlands" (Cambridge, 1932)
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