The Deplorable State of America, or Sc___h Government

Anonymous, British, 18th century

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

In this allegorical satire a seated Britannia offers a Pandora's Box to America, the box intended as a symbol of the Stamp Act. Minerva, representing wisdom, advises America not to take it, while Liberty lies on the ground oppressed by a thistle (a reference to George III's chief minister, the Scottish Lord Bute), and attacked by a serpent that embodies treachery. Mercury, a symbol of truth, departs from America.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.

Metropolitan Museum of Art