Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 55.djvu/424

Taylor surroundings to form the retreat of a literary and meditative recluse. There he married, on 17 Aug. 1825, Elizabeth, second daughter of James Medland of Newington, the friend and correspondent of his sister Jane.

In the two succeeding years appeared ‘History of the Transmission of Ancient Books to Modern Times’ (London, 1827, 8vo) and ‘The Process of Historical Proof’ (London, 1828, 8vo; the two were remodelled as a single work, 1859, 8vo), in which he attempted to show grounds on which a rigorous criticism might accept literary documents like the Bible as a basis for historical study. Next appeared an expurgated translation of Herodotus (London, 1829, 8vo), the researches incidental to which seem to have suggested an anonymous romance, ‘The Temple of Melekartha’ (London, 1831, 8vo), dealing with the prehistoric migration of the Tyrians from the Persian Gulf to the Levant. In the heroine the author is said to have depicted his young wife. Anonymously, too, appeared in May 1829 his next work, ‘The Natural History of Enthusiasm (London, 8vo; Boston, 1830, 12mo; 10th edit. London, 1845), by which he is best remembered. It was a sort of historico-philosophical disquisition on the perversions of religious imagination, and was written with a freshness and vigour which gave it an instant vogue. Taylor developed the subject in his ‘Fanaticism’ (London, 1833, 8vo ; 7th edit. 1866) and ‘Spiritual Despotism’ (London, 1835, three editions). Three further volumes on scepticism, credulity, and the corruption of morals were included in the author’s large design of a ‘morbid anatomy of spurious religion,’ but these complementary volumes were never completed. Those that appeared were praised by Wilson in ‘Blackwood,’ and the last of the three with especial warmth by Sir James Stephen in the ‘Edinburgh Review’ (April, 1840).

In the meantime Taylor had published a more devotional volume entitled ‘Saturday Evening’ (London, 1832, 8vo; many editions in England and America). Subsequently he developed a part of that book into ‘The Physical Theory of Another Life’ (London, 1836, 12mo ; 6th edit. 1866), a work of pure speculation, anticipating a scheme of duties in a future world, adapted to the assumed expansion of our powers after death.

In 1836 Taylor, yielding against his better judgment to the advice of friends, contested the chair of logic at Edinburgh University with Sir William Hamilton, and was narrowly beaten. Similar offers in the future failed to lure him from his retirement. The tranquil life at Stanford Rivers and the devotion of thought by Taylor, as of his father before him, to the subject of education (though he himself instructed his children only in religion) are reflected in his next book on ‘Home Education’ (London, 1838, 8vo; 7th edit. 1867), in which he insisted on the beneficial influence of a country life, the educational value of children’s pleasures, and the importance of favouring the natural rather than the stimulated growth of a child’s mental powers. In March 1841, in Hanover Square, Taylor delivered four lectures on ‘Spiritual Christianity’ (London, 8vo). Soon afterwards he was induced to complete and edit a translation of the ‘Jewish Wars’ of Josephus which had been prepared by Dr. Robert Traill. It appeared in two sumptuous quarto volumes (1847 and 1851), with illustrations engraved upon a new plan devised by Taylor; but the death of Traill on the eve of publication, and the vast expense involved in a work of such limited sale, brought a severe pecuniary loss upon the editor.

By his publication during 1839–40 of ‘Ancient Christianity and the Doctrines of the Oxford Tracts’ (in 8 parts, London, 8vo; 4th edit. 1844, 2 vols. 8vo), Taylor appeared for the first time as a controversialist, his contention being that the church of the fourth century (upon the primitive usages of which the Puseyites sought to graft the institutions of the Anglican church) had already matured a large crop of superstition and error. His view was warmly contested; but he now turned gladly from patristic dispute and philosophic disquisition to ecclesiastical biography, producing two able critical studies in ‘Loyola and Jesuitism in its Rudiments’ (London, 1849, 8vo; several editions) and ‘Wesley and Methodism’ (London, 1851, 8vo; 1863, 1865, and New York, 1852). These were followed by a more popular work on the Christian argument, entitled ‘The Restoration of Belief’ (London, 1855, 8vo; several American editions), in which he had recourse once more to his favourite form of anonymous publication. ‘Logic in Theology’ and ‘Ultimate Civilisation,’ two volumes of essays reprinted in part from the ‘Eclectic Review’ during 1859 and 1860, were followed in turn by ‘The Spirit of Hebrew Poetry’ (London, 1861 ; numerous editions), a volume of lectures, originally delivered at Edinburgh, abounding in suggestive and beautiful passages, and the most important of his later works. In addition to ‘Considerations on the Pentateuch’ (London, 1863, 8vo; two editions), in which he opposed the 