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Sir William Temple
Sir William Temple 1628–99, English diplomat and author. He was married in 1655 to Dorothy Osborne . They settled in Ireland, and in 1661 Temple entered the Irish parliament. He moved (1663) to England, served on various diplomatic missions, and was made a baronet (1666). In 1668 he negotiated with great skill and speed a triple alliance with the Netherlands and Sweden to check the power of France. He became (1668) ambassador to The Hague but was secretly recalled (1670) after Charles II had concluded the secret Treaty of Dover with Louis XIV. He was reappointed (1674) at the conclusion of the unpopular English-Dutch war and negotiated the marriage (1677) of William of Orange to Princess Mary of England. Temple several times refused to become secretary of state, but he did promote a reorganization (1679) of the privy council. After this proved a failure, he retired (1681) to his estate, Moor Park, in Surrey, and devoted his time to writing. He produced a number of political works and essays. Jonathan Swift , who was Temple's secretary for various periods in the 1690s, helped prepare his letters (1700–1703) and memoirs for publication (parts of both had earlier unauthorized publication). Temple's essay, Of Ancient and Modern Learning (1690), precipitated the famous "ancients versus moderns" controversy, which caused Swift to write The Battle of the Books (1697). Temple's style in his personal essays was long considered a model of balanced and polished prose.
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"Sir William Temple." The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed.. 2011. Encyclopedia.com. 26 May. 2012 <http://www.encyclopedia.com>. "Sir William Temple." The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed.. 2011. Encyclopedia.com. (May 26, 2012). http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1E1-Temple-S.html "Sir William Temple." The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed.. 2011. Retrieved May 26, 2012 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1E1-Temple-S.html |
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Temple, Sir William
Temple, Sir William (1628–99). Diplomat and author. Educated at Cambridge and eventually successful in his patient courtship of Dorothy Osborne, Temple moved from Ireland to England in 1663 and became Arlington's protégé. Accredited envoy at Brussels (1665), with a baronetcy the following year, he negotiated the Triple Alliance as ambassador at The Hague (1668), but judiciously retired to England and his orangery at Sheen as relations deteriorated; pro-Dutch, he was recalled to negotiate the 1674 treaty which ended the Dutch War, and then, with Danby, successfully arranged the alliance between Charles's niece Mary and William of Orange (1677). Although undertaking reorganization of the Privy Council, disillusion increased, and he retired from politics (1681) to pursue gardening, fruit-growing, and writing at Moor Park, where his secretary 1689–99 was Jonathan Swift. Temple's literary reputation rests on his essays, despite Swift's satire of his style in The Battle of the Books.
A. S. Hargreaves |
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Cite this article
JOHN CANNON. "Temple, Sir William." The Oxford Companion to British History. 2002. Encyclopedia.com. 26 May. 2012 <http://www.encyclopedia.com>. JOHN CANNON. "Temple, Sir William." The Oxford Companion to British History. 2002. Encyclopedia.com. (May 26, 2012). http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O110-TempleSirWilliam.html JOHN CANNON. "Temple, Sir William." The Oxford Companion to British History. 2002. Retrieved May 26, 2012 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O110-TempleSirWilliam.html |
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Temple, Sir William
Temple, Sir William (1628–99), was envoy at Brussels in 1666, and visited The Hague, where he effected the triple alliance between England, Holland, and Sweden. In 1654 he married Dorothy Osborne, whose letters to him give a vivid picture of the times. He first settled at Sheen, then at Moor Park, near Farnham, where Swift was a member of his household. His principal works include Observations upon…the Netherlands (1672), an essay upon The Advancement of Trade in Ireland (1673), and three volumes of Miscellanea (1680, 1692, 1701). The second of these contains ‘Of Ancient and Modern Learning’, an essay which, by its uncritical praise of the spurious epistles of Phalaris, exposed Temple to the censure of Bentley and led to a vigorous controversy.
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Cite this article
MARGARET DRABBLE and JENNY STRINGER. "Temple, Sir William." The Concise Oxford Companion to English Literature. 2003. Encyclopedia.com. 26 May. 2012 <http://www.encyclopedia.com>. MARGARET DRABBLE and JENNY STRINGER. "Temple, Sir William." The Concise Oxford Companion to English Literature. 2003. Encyclopedia.com. (May 26, 2012). http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O54-TempleSirWilliam.html MARGARET DRABBLE and JENNY STRINGER. "Temple, Sir William." The Concise Oxford Companion to English Literature. 2003. Retrieved May 26, 2012 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O54-TempleSirWilliam.html |
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Temple, Sir William
Temple, Sir William (1628–99). Diplomat and author. Educated at Cambridge, Temple moved from Ireland to England in 1663 and became Arlington's protégé. Accredited envoy at Brussels (1665), he negotiated the Triple Alliance as ambassador at The Hague (1668), but retired to England as relations deteriorated; pro‐Dutch, he was recalled to negotiate the 1674 treaty ending the Dutch War, and then, with Danby, successfully arranged the alliance between Charles's niece Mary and William of Orange (1677). He retired from politics in 1681 to pursue gardening, fruit‐growing, and writing at Moor Park.
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Cite this article
JOHN CANNON. "Temple, Sir William." A Dictionary of British History. 2004. Encyclopedia.com. 26 May. 2012 <http://www.encyclopedia.com>. JOHN CANNON. "Temple, Sir William." A Dictionary of British History. 2004. Encyclopedia.com. (May 26, 2012). http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O43-TempleSirWilliam.html JOHN CANNON. "Temple, Sir William." A Dictionary of British History. 2004. Retrieved May 26, 2012 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O43-TempleSirWilliam.html |
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