Robert Taylor (Radical) - Qualification and Turn To Anti-clericalism

Qualification and Turn To Anti-clericalism

Taylor studied at St John's College, Cambridge for three years to qualify as a clergyman. At that time the University of Cambridge was dominated by the established Church of England and most students were preparing for positions in the Anglican church. The Revd. Charles Simeon gained Taylor his first curacy; but five years after ordination Taylor gave up on orthodox Christianity and turned from evangelism to eccentric anti-clericalism.

Taylor set up a Christian Evidence Society and lectured in London pubs dressed in elaborate vestments, attacking the Anglican liturgy and the barbarities of the Establishment for what he called its "Pagan creed". At this time blasphemy was a criminal offence against the faith "by law established", and he was sentenced to a year in gaol. In his cell he wrote The Diegesis, attacking Christianity on the basis of comparative mythology and attempting to expound it as a scheme of solar myths.