2


He seems, either through inflence or talent, to have made his mark as a doctor. In July, 1614, he was recommended by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Lord Chancellor to be elected physician of Thomas Sutton's newly founded hospital, the Charterhouse, and we may presume the appointment was made. In May, 1627, Charles I. recommended him as physician to the Emperor of Russia, and in June it was agreed to send letters out by him or his agent, the stipulation being made that he must sail at once, "or not have passage this year."

He took up his abode at Moscow, if not in the splendour and riches offered to his father, at least sufficiently provided for to maintain his huge family in comfort. Four or five of his twelve children died in infancy; the complete list of them, as given in his father's book of horoscopes in the British Museum, is as under: -

Margaret born April 4, 1603.
Jane " March 31, 1605.
John " July 24, 1606 (died).
Arthur " March 16, 1608.
Maria " February 24, 1612.
Rowland " September 8, 1613.
Isabel " September 5, 1614.
Frances " October 25, 1615.
William " August 27, 1617.
John " March 30, 1619.
Edmund baptised August 27, 1620.
buried September 23, 1621.
Anna born January 15, 1622.

Arthur's wife, Isabella Dee, died July 24, 1634. About this time he returned to England and settled in Norwich, near his friend, Sir Thomas Browne, who was then busily engaged in writing down the ethical and theological conclusions which he called the Religio Medici. Browne was, of course, the younger man. Writing in 1658, a few years after Arthur's death, to Elias Ashmole, Sir Thomas tells of the many talks about the doings of Dee and Kelly that he had with "my familiar friend, sonne unto old Doctor Dee, the mathematician," who had "lived many years and died in Norwich." Browne sent to Ashmole "the scheme of Arthur's nativity, erected by his father, Dr. John Dee," a copy from the original, made by Arthur himself, with comments added by a Moscow astrologer, Franciscus Murrerus.

Dr. Arthur, in spite, or perhaps because, of his early environment, retained until his dying day a devout belief in the possibilities of alchemy to make projection or transmutation. He had grown up in the fixed idea that the ever-exclusive secret would soon be found out. In fact, he was persuaded that divers workers had indeed discovered the art. The child of seven or eight, who had played with quoits or playthings, which he understood had been turned into gold upon the premises, was likely to retain this conviction. To doubt it would be to cast a slur upon his father's memory. Of Kelly his recollections - the recollections of a boy under nine - could be but dim and hazy, untouched with any possible scepticism or critical judgment. After the February day when Kelly rode off to Prague in 1588, neither Arthur or his father had ever set eyes on this adventurer again.

He had succeeded in convincing his old friend of the truth of these recollections, for Browne writes of him as "a persevering student in hermeticall philosophy, who had no small encouragement, having see projection made, and with the highest asseverations he confirmed unto his death that he had ocularly, undeceivably and frequently beheld it in Bohemia. And to my knowledge, had not an accident prevented, he had, not many years before his death, retired beyond the sea and fallen upon the solemn process of the great work."


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