Interest in the occult has spread like wildfire during the latter half of the century, a state of affairs which the Order of Reason bemoans and which the Traditions are taking full advantage of. A short list of the prominent groups and movements is given below, along with how the mages of the city are involved in them. These can be excellent sources for background for mage characters and mortal consorts alike, since most of the Traditions recruit heavily from them.
The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn will be founded in a couple years as part of an ongoing effort by the Londinium Collegium to steal talented Freemasons away from the Order of Reason. It is a small part of a greater mystical battle between the Masons and the Hermetics, which the Theosophists are beginning to get embroiled in as they also seek out new members. The Golden Dawn will be a vehicle for reintroducing the Hermetic paradigm back into the world in an attempt by the Collegium to take advantage of the success of the Spiritualist movement and Theosophy. The struggle between the factions backing these groups will turn the Order into a vicious den of politics and intrigue and many speculate that this will end up tearing it apart in the end.
The Theosophical Society was founded by Madame Blavatsky, a Russian born psychic and spiritualist who was courted early in her career by a powerful mage of indeterminate Tradition who set her on a path to bring the mystical teachings of the East into the West and integrate both sets of traditions. She has had a great deal of success with this in the last twenty years, recently returning from India to settle down in London. The covenant which bears the same name is formed of awakened members of her religion as well as Dreamspeakers, Euthanatos, Ecstatics, and Akashics who feel that her methods are the best means of preserving their beliefs in the modern world which has presented itself. Its success is tied closely with Spiritualism's and the Dreamspeakers, in particular, see in it their future and are thus highly protective of it, particularly against Hermetic attempts to influence it.
The Society for Psychical Study was founded with the help of the Order of Reason to investigate and debunk the claims of Spiritualists and other mystics operating in London. It has already declared Madame Blavastsky to be a fake and destroyed the reputation and credibility of countless mediums and psychics. While few of the members are actually Enlightened, the Order still keeps very close tabs on it, lest it find something it can verify or be taken over by Tradition pawns.
The Freemasons is perhaps the most powerful social club in the British Empire. The current Grand Master is no other than His Royal Highness Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, and its members include prominent artists like Gilbert and Sullivan, statesmen like Cecil Rhodes and Lord Randolph Churchill, writers like Arthur Conan Doyle and Rudyard Kipling, and numerous other gentlemen of position and influence. At the heart of this organization are the Masons of the Order of Reason, using this vast web of contacts to manipulate the fabric of Victorian society. They aren't the only ones, however, as many Freemasons are also Theosophists and members of the Golden Dawn, giving the Dreamspeakers and Hermetics inroads into this old boys network. As the Masons get more desperate, this organization is also used as a way to discretely contact allies outside of the Order of Reason who may assist in undermining the current leadership.
The Hellfire Clubs are small organizations of decadent and generally wealthy young men and women who play at petty Satanism, mostly as an excuse to indulge in carnal pleasures and for the rush of blasphemy. However, some of the members of these clubs actually stumble upon some real rituals and a few are even recruited by one of the Enlightened covenants, particularly the nephandic Monks of Medmenham. United through organizations such as the Society of Dilettanti, neo-classicists who've done the Grand Tour of the continent, their petty infernalism actually has roots in the Dilettanti Clubs of Renaissance Italty and the nephandic sects within them.