158 The Poetry of Mary Robinsonreigns – and worlds shall be no more!” (13–4). The second sonnet,
“To Philanthropy,” is similarly polemical but more radical; another
allegorical apostrophe, this sonnet sets the principle of philanthropy
against the social distinctions among humankind, which Portia calls
a spurious “mummery of empty show.” In the spirit of philanthropy,
she argues, all “seek the same inevitable goal”—equality—because
we are each of us “Stung by distinctions, that from custom grow” (1:
316; 5–8). Five years later, Portia’s sonnet thus continues the refuta-
tion of Burke’s Reflections. But it also addresses racism and the aboli-
tion debate: Philanthropy knows that “The ETHIOP’S dusky brow,
CIRCASSIA’S rose, / Are but the varying tints of breathing clay!”
(10–1). Portia’s polemic is circuitous but powerful: The dichotomy
between the black Africans and the Circassians, who were thought
to be the original Caucasians and thus the epitome of white perfec-
tion, also alludes to the fact that the Circassian region was subject to
Russia’s imperial objectives. The invasion motif is powerfully ref lex-
ive, applied as it is to the subjugated whites but, in the context of the
abolition debate, ultimately rerouted to remind the reader of exploited
Ethiopians. Robinson’s figurative language employs a human synec-
doche for the Ethiopian, but a nonhuman metaphor for the Circassian
that only indirectly suggests whiteness. Moreover, adapting Gray’s
oft- cited line “The paths of glory lead but to the grave” from Elegy
Written in a Country Churchyard, Robinson employs it in the service
of her point about racial and social equality: “Life’s gilded pageant,
dazzling as it goes, / Stops at the sepulchre, and fades away, / To
let the BEGGAR and the PRINCE repose!” (12–4). Such leveling is
a consistent motif in Robinson’s Portia poems, but the contrast of
race is peculiar to the sonnet “To Philanthropy.” The issue of race
in this case thus also recalls Shakespeare’s Portia’s rejection of the
African Prince of Morocco in The Merchant of Venice, whose first line
in the play is “Mislike me not for my complexion” (2.1.1). When he
fails to select the right casket and thus fails to win Portia’s hand in
marriage, she dispenses with him, saying, “A gentle riddance. Draw
the curtains, go. / Let all of his complexion choose me so” (2.7.79).
While reading Portia’s blatant racism here in relation to her treatment
of Shylock is perhaps anachronistic, the character’s obvious distaste
for the idea of a black husband reverberates as an allusive counter-
point in Robinson’s Portia’s humanitarian sonnet. Just a few months
earlier William Wilberforce’s latest attempt to abolish the slave trade
had failed in the House of Commons. Robinson was acutely aware
of the issue because, in March of 1794, her lover, Tarleton, as MP
for Liverpool, voiced his opposition to abolition on the grounds that9780230100251_06_ch04.indd 1589780230100251_06_ch04.indd 158 12/28/2010 11:08:49 AM12/28/2010 11:08:49 AM
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