Sir William Temple achieved success in a variety of prose genres: the familiar essay, for which he is best known; the political analysis, full of his reasoned responses to contemporary events; and the political memoir, a form he introduced into English literature. His style, which ranges from the conversational to the Ciceronian, won wide admiration during the eighteenth century. Samuel Johnson, for instance, praised Temple as the first to write English prose with cadence. Although Temple was not a profound or systematic thinker, his observations on issues as diverse as gout and government are fresh, often original, and always engaging because of his personal involvement, his sensible and balanced views, his cosmopolitan perspective, his open-mindedness, his seeming frankness, and his charming optimism about achieving that rarest of human amenities--happiness. Temple's writings were popular during his lifetime, and after his death, his collected works went through seven editions by...