Artist/Maker

Hagerty, John __Publisher ||Bakewell, J. __After ||Morton __Engraver

Place Made

Date Made

1791

Medium

paper –ink

Dimensions

HOA: 14″; WOA: 10″(unframed)
HOA: 18 1/4″; WOA: 14 1/4″ (framed)

Accession Number

4709

Description

This print was issued by John Hagerty (1747-1823 a Methodist preacher who established himself as a Baltimore printer-publisher specializing in evangelical works. In 1791 he published a trio of prints: The Tree of Life, Hieroglyphicks of a Christian (a tree of virtues), and Hieroglyphicks of the Natural Man (a tree of vices). These prints are close copies of English prints of the same period published in London by Bowles & Carver after artwork by J. Bakewell. (See The Lewis Walpole Library at Yale 771.01/01/01/2+ and the British Museum 1935,0522.3.52)

The print illustrates the many ways man sins and the affects of that sin on man. Each sin is shown as a fig or an apple on a tree whose trunk is labeled “unbelief” and whose main branches are named “lust of the eye.” The tree is shown being watered by the devil. Death, depicted as a skeleton, is shown ready to cut down the tree. God’s wrath is depicted in the form of dark clouds and lightening striking the tree.

DESCRIPTION: Copperplate engraving on paper showing a leafless tree of vices on which are the fruits of unbelief; in the sky are clouds and a bolt of lightening; a snake is coiled in the tree at junction of branches; an angelic-like figure with wings and a bird fly away from the tree; a skeleton prepares to cut down the tree with an ax on one side while on the left a figure with a tail and wings waters it.

Credit Line

MESDA Purchase Fund