TEMPLE, Sir WILLIAM ( 628-99 ) . An Eng lish statesman and essayist, born in London. He was reared by an uncle, Dr. Henry Hammond, rector of Penshurst, in Kent. He entered Em manuel College, Cambridge, in 1644; but he left four years later without a degree, and set out for France. On this journey he met Dorothy Osborne (1627-95), the daughter of a stanch royalist, whom he married in 1655. Dorothy's letters during the last years of the courtship possess great charm. In 1665 Temple was sent.
to Westphalia on a secret mission to the Bishop of Munster. On his return (1666) he was created a baronet, and appointed resident at the Court of Brussels. His most important diplo matic success was the famous treaty of 1668, known as the Triple Alliance, by which Eng land, Holland, and Sweden bound themselves to unite in curbing the ambition of France. Temple was long Ambassador at The Hague and helped to bring about the marriage of the Prince of Orange with the Princess Mary (1677). In 1679 Charles 11. urged him to become his Secretary of State. Though Temple refused this post, he attempted to reform the government by estab lishing a privy council of thirty members, by whom the King promised to be guided in all public affairs, but this council proved an utter failure. Temple soon abandoned politics and retired, first to Sheen, and then to Moor Park in Surrey, where for the last ten years of his life he de voted himself to landscape gardening and to lit erature. During this period he received into
his household as amanuensis, and afterwards as secretary, Jonathan Swift (q.v.), who ultimately became his literary executor.
As a writer Temple is now known chiefly by his historical Memoirs (unauthorized ed, 1691; 1709) and his Miscellanea (1G80; 1692). In the series of 1692 first appeared the famous essay on Ancient and Modern Learning, which deals with the comparative merits of ancient and modern literature. The outcome of the spirited controversy in England was Swift's Battle of the Books (1704). (See BATTLE OF TEE BOOKS.) Temple has been considered one of the reformers of English style. According to Dr. Johnson he was the first writer to give cadence to English prose." During the eight eenth century Temple's essays were regarded as models; his English was particularly pleasing to Charles Lamb, w•ho comments upon it in his "Essay on the Genteel Style." But the later tendency toward limpidity in prose writing leaves Temple's work with little more than an historical value. Consult his Works (London, 18141 ; the Life, Works, and Correspondence, by Courtenay (ib., 1830) ; and Macaulay's article on this biography in the Edinburgh Reriew for October, 1S38 (reprinted in Essays) ; Dorothy Osborne's Letters, ed. by Parry (London, 1888).