ENGLISH LITERATURE (CBSE/UGC NET)

Detailed explanation-1: -Pope wrote “A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking largely sobers us again.”

Detailed explanation-2: -What Alexander Pope actually wrote in his often-misquoted “Essay on Criticism” (1711) was: A little learning is a dangerous thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, And drinking largely sobers us again.

Detailed explanation-3: -Alexader Pope’s A Little Learning is a Dangerous Thing is a poem about youthful exuberance and aged wisdom. The poem seems to suggest that a small amount of education is dangerous and that to not deeply drink from the fountain of knowledge will cause intoxication.

Detailed explanation-4: -People who know only a little do not understand how little they know and are therefore prone to error. First said by Alexander Pope.

Detailed explanation-5: -’Hope springs eternal in the human breast’. And here’s another common phrase we owe to Pope: ‘hope springs eternal’.