ABSTRACT
The fact that Dee's alchemical and spiritual pursuits were concurrent with his work on the calendar and extensive involvement in the planning of several voyages of exploration indicate that these activities were not mutually exclusive. While he could pursue these diverse activities without apparent conflict, the resurgence of spiritual magic is ominous since it is also difficult to ignore the fact that quite abruptly, and at a time when several projects were still incomplete, Dee left England with his recently discovered and most successful scryer to follow a Polish lord on his return to eastern Europe. The motivation behind this juggernaut is of considerable interest, since this absorption in spirit magic and eastern European adventure bring to an effective close his productive career and his intellectual development. Since he was interested, if not attempting to practise, spirit magic from the late l560s, the answer is more complex than that he had discovered something new. This displacement seems to have resulted less because this spirit magic was intrinsically incompatible with the practice of 'normal' science than
because Dee's activities turned increasingly to ideological and political issues in conjunction with his involvement with English projects of geographical exploration and because it was a compensation for the growing disappointment of his social and intellectual ambitions at the same time, Dee's activities during his Mortlake residence were explorations in exploiting his various intellectual accomplishments to define a role for himself within Elizabethan society and to secure reliable support for his intellectual pursuits.
