Victorian organization dedicated to the investigation and spread of occultism. Drawing on the theosophist and spiritualist movements, the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn (1887-1923) brought together into a single system a wide body of occult material. Under their leaders Mac¬ Gregor Mathers, Dr. William Wynn Westcott, and Dr. W. R. Woodman, the Magicians of the Golden Dawn tried to organize MAGIC based on a mix of esoteric knowledge, including the legends of Christian Rosenkreuz (founder of the Rosicrucians), the rituals of Freemasonry, and the Jewish Kabbalah. The Golden Dawn and its inner circle, the Order of the Rose of Ruby and the Cross of Gold, attracted many adherents from upper-class and literary circles. Among followers were the Irish poet W. B. Yeats, his friend and supporter Annie Horniman, George Bernard Shaw’s mistress Florence Farr, and the self-pro¬ claimed “wickedest man alive,” Aleister Crowley.
As magicians, the members of the Order of the Golden Dawn were practicing pseudoscientists. Magic is a pseudoscience because it does not rely on experimentation and the scientific method to work out its results. The order was based on one of the most famous frauds of the late 19th century. Dr. Westcott, the founder, claimed to have discovered a manuscript of unknown origin, written in a peculiar script. He deciphered it and said that it gave a brief outline of five magical rituals. Westcott asked his friend Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers, an experienced occultist, to complete the rituals. In the meantime, he wrote to a German, Fraulein Sprengel, whose address he found along with the manuscript, asking for her permission to start an English society to perform the rituals. In 1888, Westcott, Mathers, and Dr. Woodman formed the Isis-Urania Temple of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.