Lord Chesterfield

Philip Dormer Stanhope, fourth Earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773), was an English statesman, diplomat and wit. He sat in the Commons, succeeded to the earldom in 1726, served as ambassador to The Hague, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and Secretary of State, and carried the act that brought the Gregorian calendar to Britain in 1752. His letters to his illegitimate son Philip, written over thirty years and published after both men's deaths in 1774, became the classic English guide to manners and worldly wisdom, though Samuel Johnson said they taught the morals of a whore and the manners of a dancing master.