Language: en
Meaning: (idiomatic,chieflyliterary)The source ofknowledge,inspiration, orlearning.1711May, [Alexander Pope],An Essay on Criticism, London:[…]W[illiam]Lewis[…]; and sold by W[illiam]Taylor[…], T[homas]Osborn[e][…], and J[ohn]Graves[…],→OCLC:A little Learning is a dang'rous Thing;Drink deep, or taste not thePierian Spring.1817,S[amuel] T[aylor] Coleridge, “The Motives of the Present Work—Reception of the Author’s First Publication—The Discipline of His Taste at School—The Effect of Contemporary Writers on Youthful Minds—[William Lisle]Bowles’s Sonnets—Comparison between the Poets before and since Mr.[Alexander]Pope”, inBiographia Literaria; or Biographical Sketches of My Literary Life and Opinions, volume I, London: Rest Fenner,[…],→OCLC,pages7–9:At school I enjoyed the inestimable advantage of a very sensible, though at the same time, a very severe master.[…][H]e showed no mercy to phrase, metaphor, or image, unsupported by a sound sense, or where the same sense might have been conveyed with equal force and dignity in plainer words.[…]In fancy I can almost hear him now, exclaiming "Harp? Harp? Lyre? Pen and ink, boy, you mean! Muse, boy, Muse? Your Nurse's daughter, you mean!Pierian spring? Oh 'aye! the cloister-pump, I suppose!"1892,Ambrose Bierce, “A Poet's Father”, inBlack Beetles in Amber:[…]a studious landWhere humming youth, intent upon the page,Thirsting for knowledge with a noble rage,Drink dry the wholePierian spring2009January 2,Timothy W. Ryback, “First Chapter:Hitler’s Private Library”, inNew York Times, retrieved9 August 2015:For him the library represented aPierian spring, that metaphorical source of knowledge and inspiration. He drew deeply there, quelling his intellectual insecurities and nourishing his fanatic ambitions.
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