Thomas Taylor
Encyclopedia
Thomas Taylor was an English
translator and Neoplatonist, the first to translate into English
the complete works of Aristotle
and of Plato
, as well as the Orphic fragments.
, Taylor was educated at St. Paul's School, and devoted himself to the study of the classics and of mathematics. After first working as a clerk in Lubbock's Bank, he was appointed Assistant Secretary to the Society for the Encouragement of Art (precursor to the Royal Society of Arts), in which capacity he made many influential friends, who furnished the means for publishing his various translations, which besides Plato
and Aristotle
, include Proclus
, Porphyry
, Apuleius
, Ocellus Lucanus
and other Neoplatonists and Pythagoreans. His aim was the translation of all the untranslated writings of the ancient Greek philosophers.
Taylor was an admirer of Hellenism
, most especially in the philosophical framework furnished by Plato and the Neoplatonists Proclus and the "most divine" Iamblichus
, whose works he translated into English. So enamoured was he of the ancients, that he and his wife talked to one another only in classical Greek.
He was also an outspoken voice against corruption in the Christianity
of his day, and its shallowness. Taylor was ridiculed and acquired many enemies, but in other quarters he was well received. Among his friends was the eccentric traveller and philosopher John "Walking" Stewart, whose gatherings Taylor was in the habit of attending.
Taylor married his childhood sweetheart Mary Morton in 1777, and they had four sons, George Burrow Taylor, John Buller Taylor, William Grainger Taylor and Thomas Taylor, and a daughter, Mary Meredith Taylor. His wife died in 1809. He married again, and his second wife Susannah died in 1823. From his second marriage he had one son, Thomas Proclus Taylor.
; Taylor's understanding of the Platonists informed his suggested emendations. His translations were influential on William Blake
, Percy Bysshe Shelley
and William Wordsworth
. In American editions they were read by Ralph Waldo Emerson
, Bronson Alcott, and G. R. S. Mead
, secretary to Mme Blavatsky, the founder of Theosophy
.
Taylor also published several original works on philosophy (in particular, the Neoplatonism of Proclus
and Iamblichus
) and mathematics. These works have been republished (some for the first time since Taylor's lifetime) by Prometheus Trust.
It appears that he and his wife were landlords at Walworth
in the late 1770s to a family that included the 18 year old Mary Wollstonecraft
; it is not clear whether the future author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
actually knew the Taylors, as at that age she left home for a job as a lady's companion
. Wollstonecraft's 1792 magnum opus
inspired Taylor to write his satirical A Vindication of the Rights of Brutes: if women have rights, why not animals too
?
Among his miscellanies are:
Proclus
Porphyry
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
translator and Neoplatonist, the first to translate into English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
the complete works of Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
and of Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...
, as well as the Orphic fragments.
Biography
Born in LondonLondon
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, Taylor was educated at St. Paul's School, and devoted himself to the study of the classics and of mathematics. After first working as a clerk in Lubbock's Bank, he was appointed Assistant Secretary to the Society for the Encouragement of Art (precursor to the Royal Society of Arts), in which capacity he made many influential friends, who furnished the means for publishing his various translations, which besides Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...
and Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
, include Proclus
Proclus
Proclus Lycaeus , called "The Successor" or "Diadochos" , was a Greek Neoplatonist philosopher, one of the last major Classical philosophers . He set forth one of the most elaborate and fully developed systems of Neoplatonism...
, Porphyry
Porphyry (philosopher)
Porphyry of Tyre , Porphyrios, AD 234–c. 305) was a Neoplatonic philosopher who was born in Tyre. He edited and published the Enneads, the only collection of the work of his teacher Plotinus. He also wrote many works himself on a wide variety of topics...
, Apuleius
Apuleius
Apuleius was a Latin prose writer. He was a Berber, from Madaurus . He studied Platonist philosophy in Athens; travelled to Italy, Asia Minor and Egypt; and was an initiate in several cults or mysteries. The most famous incident in his life was when he was accused of using magic to gain the...
, Ocellus Lucanus
Ocellus Lucanus
Ocellus Lucanus, a Pythagorean philosopher, born in Lucania in the 5th century BC, was perhaps a pupil of Pythagoras himself.Stobaeus Ocellus Lucanus, a Pythagorean philosopher, born in Lucania in the 5th century BC, was perhaps a pupil of Pythagoras himself.Stobaeus Ocellus Lucanus, a Pythagorean...
and other Neoplatonists and Pythagoreans. His aim was the translation of all the untranslated writings of the ancient Greek philosophers.
Taylor was an admirer of Hellenism
Ancient Greek religion
Greek religion encompasses the collection of beliefs and rituals practiced in ancient Greece in the form of both popular public religion and cult practices. These different groups varied enough for it to be possible to speak of Greek religions or "cults" in the plural, though most of them shared...
, most especially in the philosophical framework furnished by Plato and the Neoplatonists Proclus and the "most divine" Iamblichus
Iamblichus of Chalcis
Iamblichus, also known as Iamblichus Chalcidensis, was an Assyrian Neoplatonist philosopher who determined the direction taken by later Neoplatonic philosophy...
, whose works he translated into English. So enamoured was he of the ancients, that he and his wife talked to one another only in classical Greek.
He was also an outspoken voice against corruption in the Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
of his day, and its shallowness. Taylor was ridiculed and acquired many enemies, but in other quarters he was well received. Among his friends was the eccentric traveller and philosopher John "Walking" Stewart, whose gatherings Taylor was in the habit of attending.
Taylor married his childhood sweetheart Mary Morton in 1777, and they had four sons, George Burrow Taylor, John Buller Taylor, William Grainger Taylor and Thomas Taylor, and a daughter, Mary Meredith Taylor. His wife died in 1809. He married again, and his second wife Susannah died in 1823. From his second marriage he had one son, Thomas Proclus Taylor.
Influence
The texts that he used had been edited since the 16th century, but were interrupted by lacunaeLacuna (manuscripts)
A lacunaPlural lacunae. From Latin lacūna , diminutive form of lacus . is a gap in a manuscript, inscription, text, painting, or a musical work...
; Taylor's understanding of the Platonists informed his suggested emendations. His translations were influential on William Blake
William Blake
William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age...
, Percy Bysshe Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets and is critically regarded as among the finest lyric poets in the English language. Shelley was famous for his association with John Keats and Lord Byron...
and William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth was a major English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with the 1798 joint publication Lyrical Ballads....
. In American editions they were read by Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, lecturer, and poet, who led the Transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century...
, Bronson Alcott, and G. R. S. Mead
G. R. S. Mead
George Robert Stowe Mead was an author, editor, translator, and an influential member of the Theosophical Society as well as the founder of the Quest Society.-Birth and family:...
, secretary to Mme Blavatsky, the founder of Theosophy
Theosophy
Theosophy, in its modern presentation, is a spiritual philosophy developed since the late 19th century. Its major themes were originally described mainly by Helena Blavatsky , co-founder of the Theosophical Society...
.
Taylor also published several original works on philosophy (in particular, the Neoplatonism of Proclus
Proclus
Proclus Lycaeus , called "The Successor" or "Diadochos" , was a Greek Neoplatonist philosopher, one of the last major Classical philosophers . He set forth one of the most elaborate and fully developed systems of Neoplatonism...
and Iamblichus
Iamblichus of Chalcis
Iamblichus, also known as Iamblichus Chalcidensis, was an Assyrian Neoplatonist philosopher who determined the direction taken by later Neoplatonic philosophy...
) and mathematics. These works have been republished (some for the first time since Taylor's lifetime) by Prometheus Trust.
It appears that he and his wife were landlords at Walworth
Walworth
-Places:United Kingdom* Walworth, County DurhamUnited States* Walworth County, South Dakota* Walworth County, Wisconsin* Walworth, New York* Walworth, Wisconsin, a village* Walworth , Wisconsin, a town...
in the late 1770s to a family that included the 18 year old Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft was an eighteenth-century British writer, philosopher, and advocate of women's rights. During her brief career, she wrote novels, treatises, a travel narrative, a history of the French Revolution, a conduct book, and a children's book...
; it is not clear whether the future author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects , written by the 18th-century British feminist Mary Wollstonecraft, is one of the earliest works of feminist philosophy. In it, Wollstonecraft responds to those educational and political theorists of the 18th...
actually knew the Taylors, as at that age she left home for a job as a lady's companion
Lady's companion
A lady's companion was a woman of genteel birth who acted as a paid companion for women of rank or wealth. The term was in use in the United Kingdom from at least the 18th century to the mid 20th century. It was related to the position of lady-in-waiting, which by the 19th century was only applied...
. Wollstonecraft's 1792 magnum opus
Magnum opus
Magnum opus , from the Latin meaning "great work", refers to the largest, and perhaps the best, greatest, most popular, or most renowned achievement of a writer, artist, or composer.-Related terms:Sometimes the term magnum opus is used to refer to simply "a great work" rather than "the...
inspired Taylor to write his satirical A Vindication of the Rights of Brutes: if women have rights, why not animals too
Animal rights
Animal rights, also known as animal liberation, is the idea that the most basic interests of non-human animals should be afforded the same consideration as the similar interests of human beings...
?
List of works
Among his translations are:- The Mystical Hymns of Orpheus (1787)
- Plato (1804)
- Aristotle (1806–12)
- The Life of Pythagoras by Iamblichus (1818)
- Apuleius; Celsus; Iamblichus; Julian; Maximus Tyrius; Pausanias; Plotinus; Porphyry; and Proclus
Among his miscellanies are:
- A Vindication of the Rights of Brutes (1792)
- A Vindication of the Rights of Brutes (1792) Modern transcription with photographs
- The Eleusinian and Bacchic Mysteries: a dissertation (c.1790). Amsterdam [i.e. London]; later editions, edited, and reprinted variously. (Fourth Edition, 1891)
- Theoretic Arithmetic (1816)
Online works
.- Thomas Taylor, The Eleusinian and Bacchic Mysteries, 1791.
- Thomas Taylor, A Vindication of the Rights of Brutes, 1792.
Translations
- Hymns of Orpheus, 1792.
- Iamblichus, On the Mysteries, 1821.
- Julian the ApostateJulian the ApostateJulian "the Apostate" , commonly known as Julian, or also Julian the Philosopher, was Roman Emperor from 361 to 363 and a noted philosopher and Greek writer....
, Two Orations of the Emperor Julian, 1793.
ProclusProclusProclus Lycaeus , called "The Successor" or "Diadochos" , was a Greek Neoplatonist philosopher, one of the last major Classical philosophers . He set forth one of the most elaborate and fully developed systems of Neoplatonism...
- Fragments That Remain of the Lost Writings of Proclus.
- Commentary on Plato's "Timaeus".
- Ten Doubts Concerning Providence and On the Existence of Evil.
PorphyryPorphyry (philosopher)Porphyry of Tyre , Porphyrios, AD 234–c. 305) was a Neoplatonic philosopher who was born in Tyre. He edited and published the Enneads, the only collection of the work of his teacher Plotinus. He also wrote many works himself on a wide variety of topics...
- Select works of Porphyry: Containing his four books On abstinence from animal food; his treatise On the Homeric cave of the nymphs; and his Auxiliaries to the perception of intelligible natures, 1823:
- On Abstinence from Animal Food (De Abstinentia):
- On the Cave of the Nymphs (De Antro Nympharum).
- Auxiliaries to the Perception of Intelligible Natures.
Biographical resources
- Complete list of original works and translations by Thomas Taylor, compiled by Ruth Balch
- The Prometheus Trust
- The Prometheus Trust: "Thomas Taylor, the English Platonist"
- Criticism of Taylor's translations of Platonicism
- Thomas Taylor, a great English Platonist Short biography and bibliography: The Shrine of Wisdom
- The Thomas Taylor Series Main Catalogue from the Prometheus Trust