Intellectual Interests
William Taylor was a nonconformist who attended the Unitarian Octagon Chapel, Norwich. He became the leading member of Norwich intelligentsia, and a political radical who applauded the French Revolution. He argued for universal suffrage and the end of all governmental intervention in the affairs of religion. He maintained radical views and the 18th century tradition of liberal and latitudinarian criticism of Biblical Scripture. In the period 1793 to 1799 he wrote over 200 reviews in periodicals, following his concept of 'philosophical criticism'.
He was nicknamed godless Billy for his radical views. A heavy drinker, his contemporary Harriet Martineau said of him:
- his habits of intemperance kept him out of the sight of ladies, and he got round him a set of ignorant and conceited young men, who thought they could set the whole world right by their destructive propensities.
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