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to a general alteration of most States and good offices in representing the matter to Kingdoms in the World.

The fame of these wondrous colloquies soon spread over England, and even reached the Continent. Dee at the same time pretended to be in possession of the elixir vita, which he stated he had found among the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey, in Somersetshire. People flocked from far and near to his house at Mortlake, to have their nativities cast, in preference to visiting astrologers of less renown. They also longed to see a man who, according to his own account, would never die. Altogether, he carried on a very profitable trade; but spent so much in drugs and metals, to work out some peculiar process of transmutation, that he never became rich.

About this time there appeared in England a wealthy Polish nobleman, named Albert Laski, Count Palatine of Siradz. His object was principally, he said, to visit the court of Queen Elizabeth, the fame of whose glory and magnificence had reached him in distant Poland. Elizabeth received this flattering stranger with the most splendid hospitality, and appointed her favorite Leicester to show him all that was worth seeing in England. He visited all the curiosities of London and Westminster, and from thence proceeded to Oxford and Cambridge, that he might converse with some of the great scholars whose writings shed lustre upon the land of their birth. He was very much disappointed at not finding Dr. Dee among them, and told the Earl of Leicester that he would not have gone to Oxford if he had known that Dee was not there. The earl promised to introduce him to the great alchemist on their return to London, and the Pole was satisfied. A few days afterward, the Earl and Laski being in the ante-chamber of the Queen, awaiting an audience of her majesty, Dr. Dee arrived on the same errand, and was introduced to the Pole. An interesting conversation ensued, which ended by the stranger inviting himself to dine with the astrologer at his house at Mortlake. Dee returned home in some tribulation; for he found he had not money enough, without pawning his plate, to entertain Count Laski and his retinue in a manner becoming their dignity. In this emergency he sent off an express to the Earl of Leicester, stating frankly the embarrassment he labored under, and praying his

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her majesty. Elizabeth immediately sent him a present of twenty pounds.

On the appointed day Count Laski came, attended by a numerous retinue, and expressed such open and warm admiration of the wonderful attainments of his host, that Dee turned over in his own mind how he could bind irretrievably to his interests a man who seemed so well inclined to become his friend. Long acquaintance with Kelly had imbued him with all the roguery of that personage, and he resolved to make the Pole pay dearly for his dinner. He found out before many days that he possessed great estates in his own country, as well as great influence, but that an extravagant disposition had reduced him to temporary embarrassment. He also discovered that he was a firm believer in the philosopher's stone and the water of life. He was therefore just the man upon whom an adventurer might fasten himself. Kelly thought so too; and both of them set to work to weave a web, in the meshes of which they might firmly entangle the rich incredulous stranger.

In this manner they prophesied to the Pole that he should become the fortunate possessor of the philosopher's stone; that he should live for centuries, and be chosen King of Poland, in which capacity he should gain many great victories over the Saracens, and make his name illustrious over all the earth. For this purpose it was necessary, however, that Laski should leave England, and take them with him, together with their wives and families; that he should treat them all sumptuously, and allow them to want for nothing. Laski at once consented; and very shortly afterward they were all on the road to Poland.

It took them upward of four months to reach the Count's estates in the neighborhood of Cracow. In the meantime they led a pleasant life, and spent money with an unsparing hand. When once established in the Count's palace, they commenced the great hermetic operation of transmuting iron into gold. Laski provided them with all necessary materials, and aided them himself with his knowledge of alchemy; but, somehow or other, the experiment always failed at the very moment it ought to have succeeded, and they were obliged to recommence operations on a grander

scale. But the hopes of Laski were not easily extinguished. Already, in idea, the possessor of countless millions, he was not to be cast down for fear of present expenses. He thus continued from day to day, and from month to month, till he was at last obliged to sell a portion of his deeply-mortgaged estates to find aliment for the hungry crucibles of Dee and Kelly, and the no less hungry stomachs of their wives and families. It was not till ruin stared him in the face that he awoke from his dream of infatuation, too happy, even then, to find that he had escaped utter beggary. Thus restored to his senses, he soon rid himself of his expensive visitors.

Not knowing well whither to direct their steps, they resolved to return to Cracow, where they had still a few friends; but, by this time, the funds they had drawn from Laski were almost exhausted, and they were many days obliged to go dinnerless and supperless. They still gained a little by casting nativities, and kept starvation at arm's length, till a new dupe, rich enough for their purposes, dropped into their toils, in the shape of a royal personage. Having procured an introduction to Stephen, king of Poland, they predicted to him that the Emperor Rudolph would shortly be assassinated, and that the Germans would look to Poland for his successor. As this prediction was not precise enough to satisfy the king, they tried their crystal again, and a spirit appeared who told them that the new sovereign of Germany would be Stephen of Poland. Stephen was credulous enough to believe them, and was once present when Kelly held his mystic conversations with the shadows of his crystal. He also appears to have furnished them with money to carry on their experiments in alchemy; but he grew tired, at last, of their broken promises and their constant drains upon his pocket, and was on the point of discarding them with disgrace when they met with another dupe, to whom they eagerly transferred their services. This was Count Rosenberg, a nobleman of large estates at Trebona, in Bohemia. So comfortable did they find themselves in the palace of this munificent patron, that they remained nearly four years with him, faring sumptuously, and having an almost unlimited command of his money.

But now, while fortune smiled upon them, while they reveled in the rewards VOL. II, No. 2-K

of successful villany, retributive justice came upon them in a shape they had not anticipated. Jealousy and mistrust sprang up between the two confederates, and led to such violent and frequent quarrels, that Dee was in constant fear of exposure. As their quarrels every day became more and more frequent, Dee wrote letters to Queen Elizabeth, to secure a favorable reception on his return to England, whither he intended to proceed if Kelly forsook him. He also sent her a round piece of silver, which he pretended he had made of a portion of brass cut out of a warming-pan. He afterward sent her the warming-pan also, that she might convince herself that the piece of silver corresponded exactly with the hole which was cut into the brass. While thus preparing for the worst, his chief desire was to remain in Bohemia with Count Rosenberg, who treated him well, and reposed much confidence in him. Neither had Kelly any great objection to remain; but a new passion had taken possession of his breast, and he was laying deep schemes to gratify it. His own wife was ill-favored and illnatured; Dee's was comely and agreeable; and he longed to make an exchange of partners without exciting the jealousy or shocking the morality of Dee. This was a difficult matter; but to a man like Kelly, who was as deficient in rectitude and right feeling as he was full of impudence and ingenuity, the difficulty was not insurmountable. He had also deeply studied the character and the foibles of Dee, and he took his measures accordingly. The next time they consulted the spirits, Kelly pretended to be shocked at their language, and refused to tell Dee what they had said. Dee insisted, and was informed that they were henceforth to have their wives in common. Dee, a little startled, inquired whether the spirits might not mean that they were to live in common harmony and good-will? Kelly tried again, with apparent reluctance, and said the spirits insisted upon the literal interpretation. The poor fanatic Dee resigned himself to their will; but it suited Kelly's purpose to appear coy a little longer. He declared that the spirits must be spirits not of good, but of evil; and refused to consult them any more. He thereupon took his departure, saying that he would never return.

Dee, thus left to himself, was in sore

trouble and distress of mind. He knew not on whom to fix as the successor of Kelly for consulting the spirits; but at last chose his son Arthur, a boy of eight years of age. He consecrated him to this service with great ceremony, and impressed upon the child's mind the dignified and awful nature of the duties he was called upon to perform; but the poor boy had neither the imagination, the faith, nor the artifice of Kelly. He looked intently upon the crystal as he was told; but could see nothing and hear nothing. At last, when his eyes ached, he said he could see a vague, indistinct shadow, but nothing more. Dee was in despair. The deception had been carried on so long, that he was never so happy as when he fancied he was holding converse with superior beings; and he cursed the day that had put estrangement between him and his dear friend Kelly. This was exactly what Kelly had foreseen; and when he thought the doctor had grieved sufficiently for his absence, he returned unexpectedly, and entered the room where the little Arthur was in vain endeavoring to distinguish something in the crystal. Dee, in entering this circumstance in his journal, ascribes this sudden return to a "miraculous fortune," and a "divine fate;" and goes on to tell that Kelly immediately saw the spirits which had remained invisible to little Arthur. One of these spirits reiterated the previous command, that they should have their wives in common. Kelly bowed his head and submitted; and Dee, in all humility, consented to the arrangement.

This was the extreme depth of the wretched man's degradation. In this manner they continued to live for three or four months, when, new quarrels breaking out, they separated once more. This time their separation was final. Kelly, taking the elixir which he had found in Glastonbury Abbey, proceeded to Prague, forgetful of the abrupt mode in which he had previously been expelled from that city. Almost immediately after his arrival he was seized by order of the Emperor Rudolph, and thrown into prison. He was released after some months' confinement, and continued for five years to lead a vagabond life in Germany, telling fortunes at one place, and pretending to make gold at another. He was a second time thrown into prison, on a charge of heresy and

sorcery: and he then resolved, if ever he obtained his liberty, to return to England. He soon discovered that there was no prospect of this, and that his imprisonment was likely to be for life. He twisted his bed-clothes into a rope, one stormy night in February 1595, and let himself down from the window of his dungeon, situated at the top of a very high tower. Being a corpulent man, the rope gave way, and he was precipitated to the ground. He broke two of his ribs, and both his legs; and was otherwise so much injured, that he expired a few days afterward.

Dee, for a while, had more prosperous fortune. The warming-pan he had sent to Queen Elizabeth was not without effect. He was rewarded soon after Kelly had left him with an invitation to return to England. His pride, which had been sorely humbled, sprang up again to its pristine dimensions, and he set out from Bohemia with a train of attendants becoming an ambassador. How he procured the money does not appear, unless from the liberality of the rich Bohemian, Rosenberg; or perhaps from his plunder. He traveled with three coaches for himself and family, and three wagons to carry his baggage. Each coach had four horses; and the whole train was protected by a guard of four-and-twenty soldiers. This statement may be doubted; but it is on the authority of Dee himself, who made it on oath before the commissioners appointed by Elizabeth to inquire into his circumstances. On his arrival in England he had an audience of the Queen, who received him kindly.

Thrown thus unexpectedly upon his own resources, Dee began in earnest the search for the philosopher's stone. He worked incessantly among his furnaces, retorts, and crucibles; and almost poisoned himself with deleterious fumes. He also consulted his miraculous crystal; but the spirits appeared not to him. He tried one Bartholomew to supply the place of the invaluable Kelly; but he being a man of some little probity, and of no imagination at all, the spirits would not hold any communication with him. Dee then tried another pretender to philosophy, of the name of Hickman, but had no better fortune. The crystal had lost its power since the departure of its great high priest. From this quarter, then, Dee could get no information on the stone or elixir of the al

chemists, and all his efforts to discover them by other means were not only fruitless but expensive. He was soon reduced to great distress, and wrote piteous letters to the Queen praying relief. He represented that, after he left England with Count Laski, the mob had pillaged his house at Mortlake, accusing him of being a necromancer and a wizard; and had broken all his furniture, burned his library, consisting of four thousand rare volumes, and destroyed all the philosophical instruments and curiosities in his museum. For this damage he claimed compensation; and furthermore stated, that, as he had come to England by the Queen's command, she ought to pay the expenses of his journey. Elizabeth sent him small sums of money at various times; but Dee still continuing his complaints, a commission was appointed to inquire into his circumstances. He finally obtained a small appointment as Chancellor of St. Paul's cathedral, which he exchanged, in 1595, for the wardenship of the college at Manchester. He remained in this capacity till 1602 or 1603, when, his strength and intellect beginning to fail him, he was compelled to resign. He retired to his old dwelling at Mortlake, in a state not far removed from actual want, supporting himself as a common fortune-teller, and being often obliged to sell or pawn his books to procure a dinner. James I. was often applied to on his behalf, but he refused to do anything for him. It may be said, to the discredit of this king, that the only reward he would grant the indefatigable Stowe, in his days of old age and want, was the royal permission to beg; but no one will blame him for neglecting such a quack as John Dee. He died in 1608, in the eighty-first year of his age, and was buried at Mortlake.

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of the Rev. Isaac Williams, of Trinity College, Oxford. Its truthfulness to the original and impressive solemnity may afford additional interest to the readers of the article referred to.

Very respectfully,

JOHN B. HENRY.

PHILADELPHIA, November, 1852.
Day of wrath! the dreadful day
Shall the banner'd cross display,
Earth in ashes melt away!

Who can paint the agony,
When His coming shall be nigh
Who shall all things judge and try?
When the trumpet's thrilling tone,
Through the tomb of ages gone,
Summons all before the throne?

Death and time shall stand aghast,
And creation at the blast
Rise to answer for the past:

Then the volume shall be spread,
And the writing shall be read,
Which shall judge the quick and dead.

Then the judge shall sit; O, then
All that's hid shall be made plain,
Unrequited naught remain.

Wo is me! what shall I plead?
Who for me shall intercede,
When the righteous scarce is freed?
King, of dreadful majesty,
Saving souls in mercy free,
Fount of pity, save thou me!

Weary, seeking me, wast thou,
And for me in death didst bow,-
Let thy pain avail me now!

Thou didst set the adulteress free,-
Heardst the thief upon the tree,-
Hope vouchsafing e'en to me.
Naught of thee my prayers can claim,
Save in thy free mercy's name;
Save me from the undying flame!

With thy sheep my place assign,
Separate from the accursed line;
Set me on thy right with thine!
When the lost, to silence driven,
To devouring flames are given,
Call me with the blest to heaven!
Suppliant, lo! to earth I bend,
My bruised heart to ashes rend;
Care thou, Lord, for my last end.

DERIVATION OF HONEYMOON.-It was the custom of a higher order of Teutones, a people who inhabited the northern part of Europe, to drink mead, or metheglin, a beverage made with honey, for thirty days after every wedding. From this custom comes the expression," to spend the honeymoon."

acters and scenes of life which are as

legitimate subjects of fictitious writing as the aspects of natural scenery are of ideal combinations in painting, or of imaginative descriptions in poetry. The mischief with our fictitious literature is its disproportion

THE DEVIL IN LITERATURE. "THE Gooded with trash in the shape of HE Cincinnati Atlas states that the West cheap blood-and-thunder stories, and it expresses the hope that the press throughout the country will help to wage a war of extermination against the nefarious traffic. This obscene and revolting literature is hawked about by agents, who insin-ate, its overwhelming abundance, and chiefuate themselves into every dwelling, office, and ly its moral characteristics. public place, and by their misrepresentations induce thousands to buy their demoralizing publications, thus diffusing the poison through the community. Are there no means, asks our Cincinnati cotemporary, to stay the torrent of impurity? None, we fear, but in cultivating a purer taste in the community, which would lead them to reject, as they would garbage, the

vile stuff offered for their mental diet. It is

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Its abundance is such that we may literally pronounce it the predominating department of modern literature. It must be remembered that only about a century has elapsed since the introduction, by Richardson and Madame D'Arblay, of the modern novel-the novel as a distinct type of literature-a picture of character and society. The old romances which preceded it--tales of chivalry or gallantry, reflections from the middle ages-were a class by themselves

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positively amazing the number of writers, male and female, of trashy tales that have sprung up in this country during the last ten years. Many of our weekly papers are laden with their contributions; and Heaven spare the digestive apparatus that can receive and assimi-poems in prose, and comparatively few late them! It is almost enough to disgust one and comparatively little read, for the with fiction to see the quantity of rubbish that people" were not then readers. In this these scribblers have the capacity of giving brief period how immense has been the forth in one wishy-washy, everlasting flood.' Let the public discourage the publication of growth of our novel literature! Like the these stories by refusing to buy them, and the ivy-the poisonous ivy on the oak-it has evil may be gradually corrected, and a more ascended and overgrown the whole tree, salutary taste be substituted." spread out upon every bough, and woven itself with almost every stem and leaf. It is, in fact, the most ostensible form of modern letters. The highest genius exhausts itself in it. The largest, though certainly not the most lasting, reputations are made by it. The best recompenses are earned by it. Fortunes, almost the only ones made in literature, are suddenly

Thus speaks the Boston Transcript. The extract is a good text for some additions to the article we gave in our last on Satanic Literature. The Cincinnati Atlas is the western paper we referred to in that article; the western editor but expresses what every traveler, not only in the West, but in the Puritan East, knows to be a fact, as the Transcript virtually acknowl-reaped by the modern novelist. Poetry, edges. The land is whelmed with this infernal literature, and perhaps no more potent means of moral corruption, especially among the young, could be devised.

Last month we made some unstinted remarks on the moral enormity of this evil.

We wish not to return to a subject so thoroughly repulsive in its nature, but to consider briefly one which is closely related to it-the bad tendencies of our novel literature in general.

the old and divine form of fiction-that which has been dear and sacred to all ages and all nations—what are its pecuniary rewards compared with those of the modern novel? The poet still retains, however, one reward, his old guerdon, and nothing shows more manifestly the general consciousness of the comparative and inherent worthlessness of the novel; the poet has yet "immortality" to aspire after the novelist, however successful, can hardly expect to survive an age or two. There are essential differences in the two kinds of literature which lead to this distinction, and which no genius of the novelist can countervail-unless by changing him into a poet as Goethe in his "Faust" and Scott in his metrical ro

We believe that from our ordinary novel literature springs the specific and corrupt class of fictions above referred to-the authorship of them and the appetite for them. We have no fanatical anathema to utter here against all novels. That we know would be preposterous. In the first article of the first number of this Maga-mances. zine we said otherwise. The qualification demanded by the subject is not a very casuistical one. Evidently there are char

The novelist takes precedence of the poet, and, indeed, of all other writers, not only in remuneration and immediate ef

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