Superficially drunk, sober when deeper

The British author Alexander Pope (1688-1744) once wrote a poem:

A little learning is a dang'rous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sober us again.

What did Pope mean by that, Magnus Lindwall wonders in his Swedish book about self esteem. He answers his own question by telling that Pope might have mean that it is easy to become unaware of speed, believing you know more than you actually do, overestimate your ability and knowledge when you just sipped at the water from spring of knowledge (for example completed a shorter education of human behaviour or read a book).

Further more he means that if you just sipped the water from spring of knowledge, you just tasted superficial knowledge and risk getting your brain drunk, like the humbleness of actually not knowing.

But the more you drink from spring of knowledge, the more sober you'll be. All of a sudden, things do not seem that easy as it first seemed. Appearances are deceptive, Lindwall writes.

And the more education I have completed, the less I know... Well, of I learn more stuff all the time, but the more I drink, the bigger this spring seems to be. An amazing feeling.


REFERENCE:
Lindwall, Magnus (2011). Självkänsla - Bortom populärpsykologi och enkla sanningar. Studentlitteratur.