No More Learning

'199 quick effluvia':

pungent odors. The construction is very condensed here; "effluvia" may
be regarded like "touch" as a subject of "were given" (l. 195); but one
would expect rather a phrase to denote a keener sense of smell than man
now possesses.


'202 music of the spheres':

it was an old belief that the stars and planets uttered musical notes as
they moved along their courses. These notes made up the "harmony of the
spheres. " Shakespeare ('Merchant of Venice', V, 64-5) says that our
senses are too dull to hear it. Pope, following a passage in Cicero's
'Somnium Scipionis', suggests that this music is too loud for human
senses.


'207-232'

Pope now goes on to show how in the animal world there is an exact
gradation of the faculties of sense and of the powers of instinct. Man
alone is endowed with reason which is more than equivalent to all these
powers and makes him lord over all animals.


'212'

The mole is almost blind; the lynx was supposed to be the most
keen-sighted of animals.


'213-214'

The lion was supposed by Pope to hunt by sight alone as the dog by
scent. What does he mean by "the tainted green"?


'215-216'

Fishes are almost deaf, while birds are very quick of hearing.


'219 nice:'

keenly discriminating.

'healing dew:'

healthful honey.
'221-222'

The power of instinct which is barely perceptible in the pig amounts
almost to the power of reason in the elephant.


'223 barrier:'

pronounced like the French 'barriere', as a word of two syllables with
the accent on the last.


'226 Sense . . . Thought:'

sensation and reason.


'227 Middle natures:'

intermediate natures, which long to unite with those above or below
them. The exact sense is not very clear.


'233-258'

In this passage Pope insists that the chain of being stretches unbroken
from God through man to the lowest created forms. If any link in this
chain were broken, as would happen if men possessed higher faculties
than are now assigned them, the whole universe would be thrown into
confusion. This is another answer to those who complain of the
imperfections of man's nature.


'234 quick:'

living. Pope does not discriminate between organic and inorganic matter.


'240 glass:'

microscope.


'242-244'

Inferior beings might then press upon us. If they did not, a fatal gap
would be left by our ascent in the scale.