CHAPTER II.

THE STORY OF DR. JOHN DEE.


The world must always feel curious to know the exact moment when its
great men first drew the breath of life; and it is satisfactory,
therefore, to be able to state, on the weighty authority of Dr. Thomas
Smith, that Dr. John Dee, the famous magician and 'philosopher,' was
born at forty minutes past four o'clock on the morning of July 13,
1527. According to the picturesque practice of latter-day biographers,
here I ought to describe a glorious summer sunrise, the golden light
spreading over hill and pasture, the bland warm air stealing into the
chamber where lay the mother and her infant; but I forbear, as, for
all I know, this particular July morning may have been cloudy, cold,
and wet; besides, John, the son of Rowland Dee, was born in London.
From like want of information I refrain from comments on Master Dee's
early bringing-up and education. But it is reported that he gave proof
of so exceptional a capacity, and of such a love of letters, that, at
the early age of fifteen, he was sent to the University of Cambridge,
to study the classics and the old scholastic philosophy. There, for
three years, he was so vehemently bent, he says, on the acquisition of
learning, that he spent eighteen hours a day on his books, reserving
two only for his meals and recreation, and four for sleep--an
unhealthy division of time, which probably over-stimulated his
cerebral system and predisposed him to delusions and caprices of the
imagination. Having taken his degree of B.A., he crossed the seas in
1547 'to speak and confer' with certain learned men, chiefly
mathematicians, such as Gemma Frisius, Gerardus Mercator, Gaspar a
Morica, and Antonius Gogara; of whom the only one now remembered is
Mercator, as the inventor of a method of laying down hydrographical
charts, in which the parallels and meridians intersect each other at
right angles. After spending some months in the Low Countries he
returned home, bringing with him 'the first astronomer's staff of
brass that was made of Gemma Frisius' devising, the two great globes
of Gerardus Mercator's making, and the astronomer's ring of brass (as
Gemma Frisius had newly framed it).'

Returning to the classic shades of Granta, he began to record his
observations of 'the heavenly influences in this elemental portion of
the world;' and I suppose it was in recognition of his scientific
scholarship that Henry VIII. appointed him to a fellowship at Trinity
College, and Greek under-reader. In the latter capacity he
superintended, in 1548, the performance of the +Eirênê+ of
Aristophanes, introducing among 'the effects' an artificial scarabæus,
which ascended, with a man and his wallet of provisions on its back,
to Jupiter's palace. This ingenious bit of mechanism delighted the
spectators, but, after the manner of the time, was ascribed to Dee's
occultism, and he found it convenient to retire to the Continent
(1548), residing for awhile at Louvain, and devoting himself to
hermetic researches, and afterwards at Paris (1580), where he
delivered scientific lectures to large and distinguished audiences.
'My auditory in Rhemes Colledge,' he says, 'was so great, and the most
part older than my selfe, that the mathematicall schooles could not
hold them; for many were faine, without the schooles, at the windowes,
to be auditors and spectators, as they best could help themselves
thereto. I did also dictate upon every proposition, beside the first
exposition. And by the first foure principall definitions representing
to the eyes (which by imagination onely are exactly to be conceived),
a greater wonder arose among the beholders, than of my Aristophanes
Scarabæus mounting up to the top of Trinity-hall in Cambridge.'

The accomplishments of this brilliant scientific mountebank being
noised abroad over all Europe, the wonderful story reached the remote
Court of the Muscovite, who offered him, if he would take up his
residence at Moscow, a stipend of £2,000 per annum, his diet also to be
allowed to him free out of 'the Emperor's own kitchen, and his place to
be ranked amongst the highest sort of the nobility there, and of his
privy councillors.' Was ever scholar so tempted before or since? In
those times, the Russian Court seems to have held _savants_ and
scholars in as much esteem as nowadays it holds _prima-donnas_ and
_ballerines_. Dee also received advantageous proposals from four
successive Emperors of Germany (Charles V., Ferdinand, Maximilian II.,
and Rudolph II.), but the Muscovite's outbade them all. A residence in
the heart of Russia had no attraction, however, for the Oxford scholar,
who, in 1551, returned to England with a halo of fame playing round his
head (to speak figuratively, as Dee himself loved to do), which
recommended him to the celebrated Greek professor at Cambridge, Sir
John Cheke. Cheke introduced him to Mr. Secretary Cecil, as well as to
Edward VI., who bestowed upon him a pension of 100 crowns per annum
(speedily exchanged, in 1553, for the Rectory of Upton-upon-Severn). At
first he met with favour from Queen Mary; but the close correspondence
he maintained with the Princess Elizabeth, who appreciated his
multifarious scholarship, exposed him to suspicion, and he was accused
of practising against the Queen's life by divers enchantments. Arrested
and imprisoned (at Hampton Court), he was subjected to rigorous
examinations, and as no charge of treason could be proved against him,
was remitted to Bishop Bonner as a possible heretic. But his enemies
failed again in their malicious intent, and in 1555 he received his
liberty. Imprisonment and suffering had not quenched his activity of
temper, and almost immediately upon his release he solicited the
Queen's assent to a plan for the restoration and preservation of
certain precious manuscripts of classical antiquity. He solicited in
vain.

When Elizabeth came to the throne, Dee, as a proficient in the occult
arts, was consulted by Dudley (afterwards Earl of Leicester) as to the
most suitable and auspicious day for her coronation. She testified to
her own belief in his skill by employing him, when her image in wax
had been discovered in Lincoln's Inn Fields, to counteract the evil
charm. But he owed her favour, we may assume, much more to his
learning, which was really extensive, than to his supposed magical
powers. He tells us that, shortly before her coronation, she summoned
him to Whitehall, remarking to his patrons, Dudley and the Earl of
Pembroke, 'Where my brother hath given him a crown, I will give him a
noble.' She was certainly more liberal to Dee than to many of her
servants who were much more deserving. In December, 1564, she granted
him the reversion of the Deanery of Gloucester. Not long afterwards
his friends recommended him for the Provostship of Eton College.
'Favourable answers' were returned, but he never received the
Provostship. He obtained permission, however, to hold for ten years
the two rectories of Upton and Long Ledenham. Later in her reign
(July, 1583), when two great nobles invited themselves to dine with
him, he was compelled to decline the honour on account of his poverty.
The Queen, on being apprised of this incident, sent him a present of
forty angels of gold. We shall come upon other proofs of her
generosity.

Dee was travelling on the Continent in 1571, and on his way through
Lorraine was seized with a dangerous sickness; whereupon the Queen not
only sent 'carefully and with great speed' two of her physicians, but
also the honourable Lord Sidney 'in a manner to tend on him,' and 'to
discern how his health bettered, and to comfort him from her Majesty
with divers very pithy speeches and gracious, and also with divers
rarities to eat, to increase his health and strength.' Philosophers
and men of letters, when they are ailing, meet with no such pleasant
attentions nowadays! But the list of Elizabeth's bounties is not yet
ended. The much-travelling scholar, who saw almost as much of cities
and men and manners as Odysseus himself, had wandered into the
farthest parts of the kingdom of Bohemia; and that no evil might come
to him, or his companion, or their families, she sent them her most
princely and royal letters of safe-conduct. After his return home, a
little before Christmas, 1589, hearing that he was unable to keep
house as liberally as became his position and repute, she promised to
assist him with the gift of a hundred pounds, and once or twice
repeated the promise on his coming into her presence. Fifty pounds he
_did_ receive, with which to keep his Christmas merrily, but what
became of the other moiety he was never able to discover. A malignant
influence frequently interposed, it would seem, between the Queen's
benevolence in intention and her charity in action; and the
unfortunate doctor was sometimes tantalized with promises of good
things which failed to be realized. On the whole, however, I do not
think he had much to complain of; and the reproach of parsimony so
often levelled at great Gloriana would certainly not apply to her
treatment of Dr. Dee.

She honoured him with several visits at Mortlake, where he had a
pleasant house close by the riverside, and a little to the westward of
the church--surrounded by gardens and green fields, with bright
prospects of the shining river. Elizabeth always came down from
Whitehall on horseback, attended by a brave retinue of courtiers; and
as she passed along, her loyal subjects stood at their doors, or lined
the roadside, making respectful bows and curtseys, and crying, 'God
save the Queen!' One of these royal visits was made on March 10, 1575,
the Queen desiring to see the doctor's famous library; but learning
that he had buried his wife only four hours before, she refused to
enter the house. Dee, however, submitted to her inspection his magic
crystal, or 'black stone,' and exhibited some of its marvellous
properties; her Majesty, for the better examination of the same, being
taken down from her horse 'by the Earl of Leicester, by the Church
wall of Mortlack.'

She was at Dr. Dee's again on September 17, 1580. This time she came
from Richmond in her coach, a wonderfully cumbrous vehicle, drawn by
six horses; 'and when she was against my garden in the fielde,' says
the doctor, 'her Majestie staide there a good while, and then came
into the street at the great gate of the field, where her Majestie
espied me at my dore, making reverent and dutifull obeysance unto her,
and with her hand her Majestie beckoned for me to come to her, and I
came to her coach side; her Majestie then very speedily pulled off her
glove, and gave me her hand to kiss; and to be short, her Majestie
wished me to resort oftener to her Court, and by some of her Privy
Chamber to give her Majestie to wete (know) when I came there.'

Another visit took place on October 10, 1580:--'The Queenes Majestie
to my great comfort (_horâ quintâ_) came with her train from the
Court, and at my dore graciously calling me unto her, on horseback
exhorted me briefly to take my mother's death patiently; and withal
told me, that the Lord Treasurer had greatly commended my doings for
her title royall, which he had to examine. The which title in two
rolls of velome parchment his Honour had some houres before brought
home, and delivered to Mr. Hudson for me to receive at my coming from
my mother's buriall at church. Her Majestie remembered also then, how
at my wives buriall it was her fortune likewise to call upon me at my
house, as before is noted.'

Dee's library--as libraries went then--was not unworthy of royal
inspection. Its proud possessor computed it to be worth £2,000, which,
at the present value of money, would be equal, I suppose, to £10,000.
It consisted of about 4,000 volumes, bound and unbound, a fourth part
being MSS. He speaks of four 'written books'--one in Greek, two in
French, and one in High Dutch--as having cost him £533, and inquires
triumphantly what must have been the value of some hundred of the
best of all the other written books, some of which were the
_autographia_ of excellent and seldom-heard-of authors? He adds that
he spent upwards of forty years in collecting this library from divers
places beyond the seas, and with much research and labour in England.

Of the 'precious books' thus collected, Dee does not mention the
titles; but he has recorded the rare and exquisitely made 'instruments
mathematical' which belonged to him: An excellent, strong, and fair
quadrant, first made by that famous Richard Chancellor who boldly
carried his discovery-ships past the Icy Cape, and anchored them in
the White Sea. There was also an excellent _radius astronomicus_, of
ten feet in length, the staff and cross very curiously divided into
equal parts, after Richard Chancellor's quadrant manner. Item, two
globes of Mercator's best making: on the celestial sphere Dee, with
his own hand, had set down divers comets, their places and motions,
according to his individual observation. Item, divers other
instruments, as the theorie of the eighth sphere, the ninth and tenth,
with an horizon and meridian of copper, made by Mercator specially for
Dr. Dee. Item, sea-compasses of different kinds. Item, a magnet-stone,
commonly called a loadstone, of great virtue. Also an excellent
watch-clock, made by one Dibbley, 'a notable workman, long since
dead,' by which the time might sensibly be measured in the seconds of
an hour--that is, not to fail the 360th part of an hour. We need not
dwell upon his store of documents relating to Irish and Welsh estates,
and of ancient seals of arms; but my curiosity, I confess, is somewhat
stirred by his reference to 'a great bladder,' with about four pounds
weight of 'a very sweetish thing,' like a brownish gum, in it,
artificially prepared by thirty times purifying, which the doctor
valued at upwards of a hundred crowns.

* * * * *

While engaged in learned studies and correspondence with learned men,
Dee found time to indulge in those wild semi-mystical, transcendental
visions which engaged the imagination of so many mediæval students.
The secret of 'the philosopher's stone' led him into fascinating
regions of speculation, and the ecstasies of Rosicrucianism dazzled
him with the idea of holding communication with the inhabitants of the
other world. How far he was sincere in these pursuits, how far he
imparted into them a spirit of charlatanry, I think it is impossible
to determine. Perhaps one may venture to say that, if to some small
extent an impostor, he was, to a much larger extent, a dupe; that if
he deceived others, he also deceived himself; nor is he, as biography
teaches, the only striking example of the credulous enthusiast who
mingles with his enthusiasm, more or less unconsciously, a leaven of
hypocrisy. As early as 1571 he complains, in the preface to his
'English Euclid,' that he is jeered at by the populace as a conjurer.
By degrees, it is evident, he begins to feel a pride in his magical
attainments. He records with the utmost gravity his remarkable dreams,
and endeavours to read the future by them. He insists, moreover, on
strange noises which he hears in his chamber. In those days a
favourite method of summoning the spirits was to bring them into a
glass or stone which had been prepared for the purpose; and in his
diary, under the date of May 25, 1581, he records--for the first
time--that he had held intercourse in this way with supra-mundane
beings.

Combining with his hermetico-magical speculations religious exercises
of great fervour, he was thus engaged, one day in November, 1582, when
suddenly upon his startled vision rose the angel Uriel 'at the west
window of his laboratory,' and presented him with a translucent stone,
or crystal, of convex shape, possessing the wonderful property of
introducing its owner to the closest possible communication with the
world of spirits. It was necessary at times that this so-called mirror
should be turned in different positions before the observer could
secure the right focus; and then the spirits appeared on its surface,
or in different parts of the room by reason of its action. Further,
only one person, whom Dee calls the _skryer_, or seer, could discover
the spirits, or hear and interpret their voices, just as there can be
but one medium, I believe, at a spiritualistic séance of the present
day. But, of course, it was requisite that, while the medium was
absorbed in his all-important task, some person should be at hand to
describe what he saw, or professed to see, and commit to paper what he
heard, or professed to hear; and a seer with a lively imagination and
a fluent tongue could go very far in both directions. This humbler,
secondary position Dee reserved for himself. Probably his invention
was not sufficiently fertile for the part of a medium, or else he was
too much in earnest to practise an intentional deception. As the
crystal showed him nothing, he himself said so, and looked about for
someone more sympathetic, or less conscientious. His choice fell at
first on a man named Barnabas Saul, and he records in his diary how,
on October 9, 1581, this man 'was strangely troubled by a spiritual
creature about midnight.' In a MS. preserved in the British Museum, he
relates some practices which took place on December 2, beginning his
account with this statement: 'I willed the skryer, named Saul, to
looke into my great crystalline globe, if God had sent his holy angel
Azrael, or no.' But Saul was a fellow of small account, with a very
limited inventive faculty, and on March 6, 1582, he was obliged to
confess 'that he neither heard nor saw any spiritual creature any
more.' Dee and his inefficient, unintelligent skryer then quarrelled,
and the latter was dismissed, leaving behind him an unsavoury
reputation.


EDWARD KELLY.

Soon afterwards our magician made the acquaintance of a certain Edward
Kelly (or Talbot), who was in every way fitted for the mediumistic
_rôle_. He was clever, plausible, impudent, unscrupulous, and a most
accomplished liar. A native of Worcester, where he was born in 1555,
he was bred up, according to one account, as a druggist, according to
another as a lawyer; but all accounts agree that he became an adept in
every kind of knavery. He was pilloried, and lost his ears (or at
least was condemned to lose them) at Lancaster, for the offence of
coining, or for forgery; afterwards retired to Wales, assumed the name
of Kelly, and practised as a conjurer and alchemist. A story is told
of him which illustrates the man's unhesitating audacity, or, at all
events, the notoriety of his character: that he carried with him one
night into the park of Walton-le-Dale, near Preston, a man who
thirsted after a knowledge of the future, and, when certain
incantations had been completed, caused his servants to dig up a
corpse, interred only the day before, that he might compel it to
answer his questions.

How he got introduced to Dr. Dee I do not profess to know; but I am
certainly disinclined to accept the wonderful narrative which Mr.
Waite renders in so agreeable a style--that Kelly, during his Welsh
sojourn, was shown an old manuscript which his landlord, an innkeeper,
had obtained under peculiar circumstances. 'It had been discovered in
the tomb of a bishop who had been buried in a neighbouring church, and
whose tomb had been sacrilegiously up-torn by some fanatics,' in the
hope of securing the treasures reported to be concealed within it.
They found nothing, however, but the aforesaid manuscript, and two
small ivory bottles, respectively containing a ponderous white and red
powder. 'These pearls beyond price were rejected by the pigs of
apostasy: one of them was shattered on the spot, and its ruddy,
celestine contents for the most part lost. The remnant, together with
the remaining bottle and the unintelligible manuscript, were speedily
disposed of to the innkeeper in exchange for a skinful of wine.' The
innkeeper, in his turn, parted with them for one pound sterling to
Master Edward Kelly, who, believing he had obtained a hermetic
treasure, hastened to London to submit it to Dr. Dee.

This accomplished and daring knave was engaged by the credulous doctor
as his skryer, at a salary of £50 per annum, with 'board and lodging,'
and all expenses paid. These were liberal terms; but it must be
admitted that Kelly earned them. Now, indeed, the crystal began to
justify its reputation! Spirits came as thick as blackberries, and
voices as numerous as those of rumour! Kelly's amazing fertility of
fancy never failed his employer, upon whose confidence he established
an extraordinary hold, by judiciously hinting doubts as to the
propriety of the work he had undertaken. How could a man be other than
trustworthy, when he frankly expressed his suspicions of the _mala
fides_ of the spirits who responded to the summons of the crystal? It
was impossible--so the doctor argued--that so candid a medium could be
an impostor, and while resenting the imputations cast upon the
'spiritual creatures,' he came to believe all the more strongly in the
man who slandered them. The difference of opinion gave rise, of
course, to an occasional quarrel. On one occasion (in April, 1582)
Kelly specially provoked his employer by roundly asserting that the
spirits were demons sent to lure them to their destruction; and by
complaining that he was confined in Dee's house as in a prison, and
that it would be better for him to be near Cotsall Plain, where he
might walk abroad without danger.

Some time in 1583 a certain 'Lord Lasky,' that is, Albert Laski or
Alasco, prince or waiwode of Siradia in Poland, and a guest at
Elizabeth's Court, made frequent visits to Dee's house, and was
admitted to the spirit exhibitions of the crystal. It has been
suggested that Kelly had conceived some ambitious projects, which he
hoped to realize through the agency of this Polish noble, and that he
made use of the crystal to work upon his imagination. Thenceforward
the spirits were continually hinting at great European revolutions,
and uttering vague predictions of some extraordinary good fortune
which was in preparation for Alasco. On May 28 Dee and Kelly were
sitting in the doctor's study, discussing the prince's affairs, when
suddenly appeared--perhaps it was an optical trick of the ingenious
Kelly--'a spiritual creature, like a pretty girl of seven or nine
years of age, attired on her head, with her hair rowled up before, and
hanging down very long behind, with a gown of soy, changeable green
and red, and with a train; she seemed to play up and down, and seemed
to go in and out behind my books, lying in heaps; and as she should
ever go between them, the books seemed to give place sufficiently,
dividing one heap from the other while she passed between them. And
so I considered, and heard the diverse reports which E. K. made unto
this pretty maid, and I said, "Whose maiden are you?"' Here follows
the conversation--inane and purposeless enough, and yet deemed worthy
of preservation by the credulous doctor:

DOCTOR DEE'S CONVERSATION WITH THE SPIRITUAL CREATURE.

SHE. Whose man are you?

DEE. I am the servant of God, both by my bound duty, and also
(I hope) by His adoption.

A VOICE. You shall be beaten if you tell.

SHE. Am not I a fine maiden? give me leave to play in your
house; my mother told me she would come and dwell here.

(_She went up and down with most lively gestures of a young
girl playing by herself, and divers times another spake to
her from the corner of my study by a great perspective
glasse, but none was seen beside herself._)

SHE. Shall I? I will. (_Now she seemed to answer me in the
foresaid corner of my study._) I pray you let me tarry a
little? (_Speaking to me in the foresaid corner._)

DEE. Tell me what you are.

SHE. I pray you let me play with you a little, and I will
tell you who I am.

DEE. In the name of Jesus then, tell me.

SHE. I rejoice in the name of Jesus, and I am a poor little
maiden; I am the last but one of my mother's children; I have
little baby children at home.

DEE. Where is your home?

SHE. I dare not tell you where I dwell, I shall be beaten.

DEE. You shall not be beaten for telling the truth to them
that love the truth; to the Eternal Truth all creatures must
be obedient.

SHE. I warrant you I will be obedient; my sisters say they
must all come and dwell with you.

DEE. I desire that they who love God should dwell with me,
and I with them.

SHE. I love you now you talk of God.

DEE. Your eldest sister--her name is Esim[ve]li.

SHE. My sister is not so short as you make her.

DEE. O, I cry you mercy! she is to be pronounced Esim[=i]li!

KELLY. She smileth; one calls her, saying, Come away, maiden.

SHE. I will read over my gentlewomen first; my master Dee
will teach me if I say amiss.

DEE. Read over your gentlewomen, as it pleaseth you.

SHE. I have gentlemen and gentlewomen; look you here.

KELLY. She bringeth a little book out of her pocket. She
pointeth to a picture in the book.

SHE. Is not this a pretty man?

DEE. What is his name?

SHE. My (mother) saith his name is Edward: look you, he hath
a crown upon his head; my mother saith that this man was Duke
of York.

And so on.

The question here suggests itself, Was this passage of nonsense Dr.
Dee's own invention? And has he compiled it for the deception of
posterity? I do not believe it. It is my firm conviction that he
recorded in perfect good faith--though I own my opinion is not very
complimentary to his intelligence--the extravagant rigmarole dictated
to him by the arch-knave Kelly, who, very possibly, added to his many
ingenuities some skill in the practices of the ventriloquist. No great
amount of artifice can have been necessary for successfully deceiving
so admirable a subject for deception as the credulous Dee. It is
probable that Dee may sometimes have suspected he was being imposed
upon; but we may be sure he was very unwilling to admit it, and that
he did his best to banish from his mind so unwelcome a suspicion. As
for Kelly, it seems clear that he had conceived some widely ambitious
and daring scheme, which, as I have said, he hoped to carry out
through the instrumentality of Alasco, whose interest he endeavoured
to stimulate by flattering his vanity, and representing the spiritual
creature as in possession of a pedigree which traced his descent from
the old Norman family of the Lacys.

With an easy invention which would have done credit to the most
prolific of romancists, he daily developed the characters of his
pretended visions.[24] Consulting the crystal on June 2, he professed
to see a spirit in the garb of a husbandman, and this spirit
rhodomontaded in mystical language about the great work Alasco was
predestined to accomplish in the conversion and regeneration of the
world. Before this invisible fictionist retired into his former
obscurity, Dee petitioned him to use his influence on behalf of a
woman who had committed suicide, and of another who had dreamed of a
treasure hidden in a cellar. Other interviews succeeded, in the course
of which much more was said about the coming purification of humanity,
and it was announced that a new code of laws, moral and religious,
would be entrusted to Dee and his companions. What a pity that this
code was never forthcoming! A third spirit, a maiden named Galerah,
made her appearance, all whose revelations bore upon Alasco, and the
greatness for which he was reserved: 'I say unto thee, his name is in
the Book of Life. The sun shall not passe his course before he be a
king. His counsel shall breed alteration of his State, yea, of the
whole world. What wouldst thou know of him?'

'If his kingdom shall be of Poland,' answered Dee, 'in what land
else?'

'Of two kingdoms,' answered Galerah.

'Which? I beseech you.'

'The one thou hast repeated, and the other he seeketh as his right.'

'God grant him,' exclaimed the pious doctor, 'sufficient direction to
do all things so as may please the highest of his calling.'

'He shall want no direction,' replied Galerah, 'in anything he
desireth.'

Whether Kelly's invention began to fail him, or whether it was a
desire to increase his influence over his dupe, I will not decide; but
at this time he revived his pretended conscientious scruples against
dealing with spirits, whom he calumniously declared to be ministers of
Satan, and intimated his intention of departing from the unhallowed
precincts of Mortlake. But the doctor could not bear with equanimity
the loss of a skryer who rendered such valuable service, and watched
his movements with the vigilance of alarm. It was towards the end of
June, the month made memorable by such important revelations, that
Kelly announced, one day, his design of riding from Mortlake to
Islington, on some private business. The doctor's fears were at once
awakened, and he fell into a condition of nervous excitement, which,
no doubt, was exactly what Kelly had hoped to provoke. 'I asked him,'
says Dee, 'why he so hasted to ride thither, and I said if it were to
ride to Mr. Henry Lee, I would go thither also, to be acquainted with
him, seeing now I had so good leisure, being eased of the book
writing. Then he said, that one told him, the other day, that the Duke
(Alasco) did but flatter him, and told him other things, both against
the Duke and me. I answered for the Duke and myself, and also said
that if the forty pounds' annuity which Mr. Lee did offer him was the
chief cause of his minde setting that way (contrary to many of his
former promises to me), that then I would assure him of fifty pounds
yearly, and would do my best, by following of my suit, to bring it to
pass as soon as I possibly could, and thereupon did make him promise
upon the Bible. Then Edward Kelly again upon the same Bible did sweare
unto me constant friendship, and never to forsake me; and, moreover,
said that unless this had so fallen out, he would have gone beyond the
seas, taking ship at Newcastle within eight days next. And so we
plight our faith each to other, taking each other by the hand upon
these points of brotherly and friendly fidelity during life, which
covenant I beseech God to turn to His honour, glory, and service, and
the comfort of our brethren (His children) here on earth.'

This concordat, however, was of brief duration. Kelly, who seems to
have been in fear of arrest,[25] still threatened to quit Dee's
service; and by adroit pressure of this kind, and by unlimited
promises to Alasco, succeeded in persuading his two confederates to
leave England clandestinely, and seek an asylum on Alasco's Polish
estates. Dee took with him his second wife, Jane Fromond, to whom he
had been married in February, 1578, his son Arthur (then about four
years old), and his children by his first wife. Kelly was also
accompanied by his wife and family.

On the night of September 21, 1583, in a storm of rain and wind, they
left Mortlake by water, and dropped down the river to a point four or
five miles below Gravesend, where they embarked on board a Danish
ship, which they had hired to take them to Holland. But the violence
of the gale was such that they were glad to transfer themselves, after
a narrow escape from shipwreck, to some fishing-smacks, which landed
them at Queenborough, in the Isle of Sheppey, in safety. There they
remained until the gale abated, and then crossed the Channel to Brill
on the 30th. Proceeding through Holland and Friesland to Embden and
Bremen, they thence made their way to Stettin, in Pomerania, arriving
on Christmas Day, and remaining until the middle of January.

Meanwhile, Kelly was careful not to intermit those revelations from
the crystal which kept alive the flame of credulous hope in the bosom
of his two dupes, and he was especially careful to stimulate the
ambition of Alasco, whose impoverished finances could ill bear the
burden imposed upon them of supporting so considerable a company. They
reached Siradia on February 3, 1584, and there the spirits suddenly
changed the tone of their communications; for Kelly, having
unexpectedly discovered that Alasco's resources were on the brink of
exhaustion, was accordingly prepared to fling him aside without
remorse. The first spiritual communication was to the effect that, on
account of his sins, he would no longer be charged with the
regeneration of the world, but he was promised possession of the
Kingdom of Moldavia. The next was an order to Dee and his companions
to leave Siradia, and repair to Cracow, where Kelly hoped, no doubt,
to get rid of the Polish prince more easily. Then the spirits began to
speak at shorter intervals, their messages varying greatly in tone and
purport, according, I suppose, as Alasco's pecuniary supplies
increased or diminished; but eventually, when all had suffered
severely from want of money, for it would seem that their tinctures
and powders never yielded them as much as an ounce of gold, the
spirits summarily dismissed the unfortunate Alasco, ordered Dee and
Kelly to repair to Prague, and entrusted Dee with a Divine
communication to Rudolph II., the Emperor of Germany.

Quarrels often occurred between the two adepts during the Cracow
period. In these Kelly was invariably the prime mover, and his object
was always the same: to confirm his influence over the man he had so
egregiously duped. At Prague, Dee was received by the Imperial Court
with the distinction due to his well-known scholarship; but no
credence was given to his mission from the spirits, and his
pretensions as a magician were politely ignored. Nor was he assisted
with any pecuniary benevolences; and the man who through his crystal
and his skryer had apparently unlimited control over the inhabitants
of the spiritual world could not count with any degree of certainty
upon his daily bread. He failed, moreover, to obtain a second
interview with the Emperor. On attending at the palace, he was
informed that the Emperor had gone to his country seat, or else that
he had just ridden forth to enjoy the pleasures of the chase, or that
his imperfect acquaintance with the Latin tongue prevented him from
conferring with Dee personally; and eventually, at the instigation of
the Papal nuncio, Dee was ordered to depart from the Imperial
territories (May, 1586).

The discredited magician then betook himself to Erfurt, and afterwards
to Cassel. He would fain have visited Italy, where he anticipated a
cordial welcome at those Courts which patronized letters and the arts,
but he was privately warned that at Rome an accusation of heresy and
magic had been preferred against him, and he had no desire to fall
into the fangs of the Inquisition. In the autumn of 1586, the
Imperial prohibition having apparently been withdrawn, he followed
Kelly into Bohemia; and in the following year we find both of them
installed as guests of a wealthy nobleman, named Rosenberg, at his
castle of Trebona. Here they renewed their intercourse with the spirit
world, and their operations in the transmutation of metals. Dee
records how, on December 9, he reached the point of projection!
Cutting a piece out of a brass warming-pan, he converted it--by merely
heating it in the fire, and pouring on it a few drops of the magical
elixir--a kind of red oil, according to some authorities--into solid,
shining silver. And there goes an idle story that he sent both the pan
and the piece of silver to Queen Elizabeth, so that, with her own
eyes, she might see how exactly they tallied, and that the piece had
really been cut out of the pan! About the same time, it is said, the
two magicians launched into a profuse expenditure,--Kelly, on one of
his maid-servants getting married, giving away gold rings to the value
of £4,000. Yet, meanwhile, Dee and Kelly were engaged in sharp
contentions, because the spirits fulfilled none of the promises made
by the latter, who, his invention (I suppose) being exhausted,
resolved, in April, 1587, to resign his office of 'skryer,' and young
Arthur Dee then made an attempt to act in his stead.

The conclusion I have arrived at, after studying the careers and
characters of our two worthies, is that they were wholly unfitted for
each other's society; a barrier of 'incompatibility' rose straitly
between them. Dee was in earnest; Kelly was practising a sham. Dee
pursued a shadow which he believed to be a substance; Kelly knew that
the shadow was nothing more than a shadow. Dee was a man of rare
scholarship and considerable intellectual power, though of a credulous
and superstitious temper; Kelly was superficial and ignorant, but
clever, astute, and ingenious, and by no means prone to fall into
delusions. The last experiment which he made on Dee's simple-mindedness
stamps the man as the rogue and knave he was; while it illustrates the
truth of the preacher's complaint that there is nothing new under the
sun. The doctrine of free marriage propounded by American enthusiasts
was a _remanet_ from the ethical system of Mr. Edward Kelly.

* * * * *

Kelly had long been on bad terms with his wife, and had conceived a
passionate attachment towards Mrs. Dee, who was young and charming,
graceful in person, and attractive in manner. To gratify his desires,
he resorted to his old machinery of the crystal and the spirits, and
soon obtained a revelation that it was the Divine pleasure he and Dr.
Dee should exchange partners. Demoralized and abased as Dee had become
through his intercourse with Kelly, he shrank at first from a proposal
so contrary to the teaching and tenor of the religion he professed,
and suggested that the revelation could mean nothing more than that
they ought to live on a footing of cordial friendship. But the
spirits insisted on a literal interpretation of their command. Dee
yielded, comparing himself with much unction to Abraham, who, in
obedience to the Divine will, consented to the sacrifice of Isaac. The
parallel, however, did not hold good, for Abraham saved his son,
whereas Dr. Dee lost his wife!

It was then Kelly's turn to affect a superior morality, and he
earnestly protested that the spirits could not be messengers from
heaven, but were servants of Satan. Whereupon they then declared that
he was no longer worthy to act as their interpreter. But why dwell
longer on this unpleasant farce? By various means of cajolery and
trickery, Kelly contrived to accomplish his design.

This communistic arrangement, however, did not long work
satisfactorily--at least, so far as the ladies were concerned; and one
can easily understand that Mrs. Dee would object to the inferior
position she occupied as Kelly's paramour. However this may be, Dee
and Kelly parted company in January, 1589; the former, according to
his own account, delivering up to the latter the mysterious elixir and
other substances which they had made use of in the transmutation of
metals. Dee had begun to turn his eyes wistfully towards his native
country, and welcomed with unfeigned delight a gracious message from
Queen Elizabeth, assuring him of a friendly reception. In the spring
he took his departure from Trebona; and it is said that he travelled
with a pomp and circumstance worthy of an ambassador, though it is
difficult to reconcile this statement with his constant complaints of
poverty. Perhaps, after all, his three coaches, with four horses to
each coach, his two or three waggons loaded with baggage and stores,
and his hired escort of six to twenty-four soldiers, whose business it
was to protect him from the enemies he supposed to be lying in wait
for him, existed only, like the philosopher's stone, in the
imagination! He landed at Gravesend on December 2, was kindly received
by the Queen at Richmond a day or two afterwards, and before the year
had run out was once more quietly settled in his house 'near the
riverside' at Mortlake.

Kelly, whom the Emperor Maximilian II. had knighted and created
Marshal of Bohemia, so strong a conviction of his hermetic abilities
had he impressed on the Imperial mind, remained in Germany. But the
ingenious, plausible rogue was kept under such rigid restraint, in
order that he might prepare an adequate quantity of the transmuting
stone or powder, that he wearied of it, and one night endeavoured to
escape. Tearing up the sheets of his bed, he twisted them into a rope,
with which to lower himself from the tower where he was confined. But
he was a man of some bulk; the rope gave way beneath his weight, and
falling to the ground, he received such severe injuries that in a few
days he expired (1593).

Dee's later life was, as Godwin remarks, 'bound in shallows and
miseries.' He had forfeited the respect of serious-minded men by his
unworthy confederacy with an unscrupulous adventurer. The Queen still
treated him with some degree of consideration, though she had lost all
faith in his magical powers, and occasionally sent him assistance. The
unfortunate man never ceased to weary her with the repetition of his
trials and troubles, and strongly complained that he had been deprived
of the income of his two small benefices during his six years'
residence on the Continent. He related the sad tale of the destruction
of his library and apparatus by an ignorant mob, which had broken into
his house immediately after his departure from England, excited by the
rumours of his strange magical practices. He enumerated the expenses
of his homeward journey, arguing that, as it had been undertaken by
the Queen's command, she ought to reimburse him. At last (in 1592) the
Queen appointed two members of her Privy Council to inquire into the
particulars of his allegations. These particulars he accordingly put
together in a curious narrative, which bore the long-winded title of:

'The Compendious Rehearsall of John Dee, his dutiful
Declaracion and Proof of the Course and Race of his Studious
Lyfe, for the Space of Halfe an Hundred Yeares, now (by God's
Favour and Helpe) fully spent, and of the very great
Injuries, Damages, and Indignities, which for those last nyne
Years he hath in England sustained (contrary to Her Majesties
very gracious Will and express Commandment), made unto the
Two Honourable Commissioners, by Her Most Excellent Majesty
thereto assigned, according to the intent of the most humble
Supplication of the said John, exhibited to Her Most Gracious
Majestie at Hampton Court, Anno 1592, November 9.'

It has been remarked that in this 'Compendious Rehearsal' he alludes
neither to his magic crystal, with its spiritualistic properties, nor
to the wonderful powder or elixir of transmutation. He founds his
claim to the Queen's patronage solely upon his intellectual eminence
and acknowledged scholarship. Nor does he allude to his Continental
experiences, except so far as relates to his homeward journey. But he
is careful to recapitulate all his services, and the encomiastic
notices they had drawn from various quarters, while he details his
losses with the most elaborate minuteness. The quaintest part of his
lamentable and most fervent petition is, however, its conclusion.
Having shown that he has tried and exhausted every means of raising
money for the support of his family, he concludes:

'Therefore, seeing the blinded lady, Fortune, doth not
governe in this commonwealth, but _justitia_ and _prudentia_,
and that in better order than in Tullie's "Republica," or
bookes of offices, they are laied forth to be followed and
performed, most reverently and earnestly (yea, in manner with
bloody teares of heart), I and my wife, our seaven children,
and our servants (seaventeene of us in all) do this day make
our petition unto your Honors, that upon all godly,
charitable, and just respects had of all that, which this day
you have seene, heard, and perceived, you will make such
report unto her Most Excellent Majestie (with humble request
for speedy reliefes) that we be not constrained to do or
suffer otherwise than becometh Christians, and true, and
faithfull, and obedient subjects to doe or suffer; and all
for want of due mainteynance.'

The main object Dee had in view was the mastership of St. Cross's
Hospital, which Elizabeth had formerly promised him. This he never
received; but in December, 1594, he was appointed to the
Chancellorship of St. Paul's Cathedral, which in the following year he
exchanged for the wardenship of the College at Manchester. He still
continued his researches into supernatural mysteries, employing
several persons in succession as 'skryers'; but he found no one so
fertile in invention as Kelly, and the crystal uttered nothing more
oracular than answers to questions about lovers' quarrels, hidden
treasures, and petty thefts--the common stock-in-trade of the
conjurer. In 1602 or 1604, he retired from his Manchester appointment,
and sought the quiet and seclusion of his favourite Mortlake. His
renown as 'a magician' had greatly increased--not a little, it would
seem, to his annoyance; for on June 5, 1604, we find that he presented
a petition to James I. at Greenwich, soliciting his royal protection
against the wrong done to him by enemies who mocked him as 'a
conjurer, or caller, or invocator of devils,' and solemnly asserting
that 'of all the great number of the very strange and frivolous fables
or histories reported and told of him (as to have been of his doing)
none were true.' It is said that the treatment Dee experienced at this
time was the primary cause of the Act passed against personal slander
(1604)--a proof of legislative wisdom which drew from Dee a versified
expression of gratitude--in which, let us hope, the sincerity of the
gratitude is not to be measured by the quality of the verse. It is
addressed to 'the Honorable Members of the Commons in the Present
Parliament,' and here is a specimen of it, which will show that,
though Dee's crystal might summon the spirits, it had no control over
the Muses:

'The honour, due unto you all,
And reverence, to you each one
I do first yield most spe-ci-all;
Grant me this time to heare my mone.

'Now (if you will) full well you may
Fowle sclaundrous tongues for ever tame;
And helpe the truth to beare some sway
In just defence of a good name.'

Thenceforward Dee sinks into almost total obscurity. His last years
were probably spent in great tribulation; and the man who had dreamed
of converting, Midas-like, all he touched into gold, seems frequently
to have wanted bread. It was a melancholy ending to a career which
might have been both useful and brilliant, if his various scholarship
and mental energy had not been expended upon a delusion. Unfortunately
for himself, Dee, with all his excellent gifts, wanted that greatest
gift of all, a sound judgment. His excitable fancy and credulous
temper made him the dupe of his own wishes, and eventually the tool of
a knave far inferior to himself in intellectual power, but surpassing
him in strength of will, in force of character, in audacity and
inventiveness. Both knave and dupe made but sorry work of their lives.
Kelly, as we have seen, broke his neck in attempting to escape from a
German prison, and Dee expired in want and dishonour, without a friend
to receive his last sigh.

He died at Mortlake in 1608, and was buried in the chancel of
Mortlake Church, where, long afterwards, Aubrey, the gossiping
antiquary, was shown an old marble slab as belonging to his tomb.

His son Arthur, after acting as physician to the Czar of Russia and to
our own Charles I., established himself in practice at Norwich, where
he died. Anthony Wood solemnly records that this Arthur, in his
boyhood, had frequently played with quoits of gold, which his father
had cast at Prague by means of his 'stone philosophical.' How often
Dee must have longed for some of those 'quoits' in his last sad days
at Mortlake, when he sold his books, one by one, to keep himself from
starvation!

After Dee's death, his fame as a magician underwent an extraordinary
revival; and in 1659, when the country was looking forward to the
immediate restoration of its Stuart line of kings, the learned Dr.
Meric Casaubon thought proper to publish, in a formidable folio
volume, the doctor's elaborate report of his--or rather
Kelly's--supposed conferences with the spirits--a notable book, as
being the initial product of spiritualism in English literature. In
his preface Casaubon remarks that, though Dee's 'carriage in certain
respects seemed to lay in works of darkness, yet all was tendered by
him to kings and princes, and by all (England alone excepted) was
listened to for a good while with good respect, and by some for a long
time embraced and entertained.' And he adds that 'the fame of it made
the Pope bestir himself, and filled all, both learned and unlearned,
with great wonder and astonishment.... As a whole, it is undoubtedly
not to be paralleled in its kind in any age or country.'

FOOTNOTES:

[24] 'Adeo viro præ credulo errore jam factus sui impos et mente
captus, et Dæmones, quo arctius horrendis hisce Sacris adhærescent
illius ambitioni vanæ summæ potestatis in Patria adipiscendæ spe et
expectatione lene euntis illum non solius Poloniæ sed alterius quoque
regni, id est primo Poloniæ, deinde alterius, viz. Moldaviæ Regem
fore, et sub quo magnæ universi mundi mutationes incepturas esse,
Judæos convertendos, et ab illo Saræmos et Ethnicos vexillo crucis
superandos, facili ludificarentur.'--Dr. Thomas Smith, 'Vitæ
Eruditissimorum ac Illustrium Virorum,' London, 1707. 'Vita Joannis
Dee,' p. 25.

[25] He was suspected of coining false money, but Dr. Dee declares he
was innocent. (June, 1583.)


NOTE.

In the curious 'Apologia' published by Dee, in 1595, in the form of a
letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury, 'containing a most briefe
Discourse Apologeticall, with a plaine Demonstration and formal
Protestation, for the lawfull, sincere, very faithfull and Christian
course of the Philosophicall studies and exercises of a certaine
studious Gentleman, an ancient Servant to her most excellent Maiesty
Royall,' he furnishes a list of 'sundry Bookes and Treatises' of which
he was the author. The best known of his printed works is the 'Monas
Hieroglyphica, Mathematicè, Anagogicè que explicata' (1564), dedicated
to the Emperor Maximilian. Then there are 'Propæ deumata Aphoristica;'
'The British Monarchy,' otherwise called the 'Petty Navy Royall: for
the politique security, abundant wealth, and the triumphant state of
this kingdom (with God's favour) procuring' (1576); and 'Paralaticæ
Commentationis, Praxcosque Nucleus quidam' (1573). His unpublished
manuscripts range over a wide field of astronomical, philosophical,
and logical inquiry. The most important seem to be 'The first great
volume of famous and rich Discoveries,' containing a good deal of
speculation about Solomon and his Ophirian voyage; 'Prester John, and
the first great Cham;' 'The Brytish Complement of the perfect Art of
Navigation;' 'The Art of Logicke, in English;' and 'De Hominis
Corpore, Spiritu, et Anima: sive Microcosmicum totius Philosophiæ
Naturalis Compendium.'

The character drawn of Dr. Dee by his learned biographer, Dr. Thomas
Smith, by no means confirms the traditional notion of him as a crafty
and credulous practiser in the Black Art. It is, on the contrary, the
portrait of a just and upright man, grave in his demeanour, modest in
his manners, abstemious in his habits; a man of studious disposition
and benevolent temper; a man held in such high esteem by his
neighbours that he was called upon to arbitrate when any differences
arose between them; a fervent Christian, attentive to all the offices
of the Church, and zealous in the defence of her faith.

Here is the original: 'Si mores exterioremque vitæ cultum
contemplemur, non quicquam ipsi in probrum et ignominium verti
possit; ut pote sobrius, probus, affectibus sedatis, compositisque
moribus, ab omni luxu et gulâ liber, justi et æqui studiosissimus,
erga pauperes beneficus, vicinis facilis et benignus, quorum lites,
atrisque partibus contendentium ad illum tanquam ad sapientum arbitrum
appellantibus, moderari et desidere solebat: in publicis sacris
coetibus et in orationibus frequens, articulorum Christianæ fidei,
in quibus omnes Orthodoxi conveniunt, strenuus assertor, zelo in
hæreses, à primitiva Ecclesia damnatas, flagrans, inqui Pecc[=o]rum,
qui virginitatem B. Mariæ ante partum Christi in dubium vocavit,
accerimè invectus: licet de controversiis inter Romanenses et
Reformatos circa reliqua doctrinæ capita non adeo semperosè solicitus,
quin sibi in Polonia et Bohemia, ubi religio ista dominatur, Missæ
interesse et communicare licere putaverit, in Anglia, uti antea, post
redditum, omnibus Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ ritibus conformis.' It must be
admitted that Dr. Smith's Latin is not exactly 'conformed' to the
Ciceronian model.