The most influential (not to say famous) Neoplatonist of the Romantic period, Thomas Taylor (1758-1835) popularized the theological arithmetic of Plato, Plotinus, Proclus, Iamblichus, and Boethius in the English-speaking world [see this appreciation by Kathleen Raine.] He was so enamoured of the ancient Greek philsophers that he and his wife were known to speak the language at home. He was admired by Shelly, Blake, and Wordsworth; Emerson called him "divine".
Among his published translations and works available online, in no particular order:
- The Hymns of Orpheus
- A Vindication of the Rights of Brutes an important document in the history of animal rights
- Introduction to the Philosophy and Writings of Plato
- Ocellus Lucanus
- The Metamorphosis of Apuleius
- The Republic of Plato
- Political Fragments of Archytas, Charondas, Zaleucus, and Other Ancient Pythagoreans
- The Dissertations of Maximus Tyrius
- The Rhetoric, Poetic, and Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle
- The Description of Greece
- The Commentaries of Proclus on the Timaeus of Plato, in Five Books
- Two Treatises of Proclus, the Platonic Successor
- Five Books of Plotinus
- Iamblichus on the Mysteries of the Egyptians, Chaldeans, and Assyrians
- Translations from the Greek Aristotle's Synopsis of the Virtues and Vices. The Similitudes of Demophilus. The Golden Sentences of Democrates. And the Pythagoric Symbols with the Explanations of Jamblichus
- Plato's Divine Dialogues
- Select Works of Plotinus
- The Eleusinian and Bacchic Mysteries
- Opuscula Platonica: The Three Fundamental Ideas of the Human Mind
- Theoretic Arithmetic, in Three Books This is Taylor's own compilation of the various expositors of the arithmetic corner of the quadrivium. If you don't know where to start with Greek maths, this book is an excellent introduction to the philsophy and practice of mathematics at a time when neither the zero, the equals sign, or Arabic numerals had been developed. This was Manly P. Hall's source for the Pythagorean arithmetic philosophy in The Secret Teachings of All Ages.
I think readers interested in the history of Western philosophy will fined Taylor's exposition and translation of the Neoplatonic doctrine invaluable in grasping, not just the Greek philosophical outlook, but Dee, Fludd, Vaughan, Michael Maier, and the other Hermetic and Rosicrucian authors who incorporated the metaphysical formulas into their own mystical Christian worldview.
A complete bibliography, Thomas Taylor, the Platonist is also available.
Taylor's complete works are being re-published by The Prometheus Trust.
Update: 2014-07-30: