Colombia dwarfs South America: about 1,139,434 km² km² against 17,840,000 km² km². At true size Colombia is about 15.7× larger — the whole of South America fits into Colombia roughly 15 times.
The old Mercator map treated both about equally (1× vs 1× inflation), so at least their relative sizes were preserved — even if both were drawn at the wrong absolute scale.
Colombia fits 15× into South America.