Sarah Scott’s “Master in the Science of Benevolence” : The History of Sir George Ellison

Abstract

Along with the earlier work Millenium Hall, The History of Sir George Ellison contains Sarah Scott's vision of utopia based on philanthropy. She places at the centre of her utopian world an exemplary hero whom she calls “a master in the science of benevolence.” Scott's master philanthropist, however, is a flawed one. Though all his actions are uniformly informed by sensibility and virtuous feelings of compassion and sympathy, there are gaps between theory and practice, leading to inconsistencies and paradoxes underlying his activities. They reveal conflicts of interests in the issues of class, gender and race. Where slavery is concerned, he is at once radical and conservative; where economic interests are involved both selfless and opportunistic, and where charity is concerned freely giving but also controlling. A strong rhetoric of sensibility deployed throughout the novel overwrites the hard realities of materialistic interests upon which the hero's utopian vision is based. Thus Ellison's utopian community, not only at home but in his plantation in Jamaica, is built upon the fantasies he creates― fantasies of happy slaves, of happy servants, and of happy women. I explore some of these aspects and question the hero's entitlement to being called “a master in the science of benevolence.”