Did Alexander Pope say “To err is human, to forgive divine”?
SAPIR 861 · QUOTE CHECK
Did Alexander Pope say “To err is human, to forgive divine”?
Found word for word. Yes. The text appears in works attributed to Alexander Pope. Source and location below.
If Wit so much from Ign'rance undergo, Ah let not Learning too commence its foe! Of old, those met rewards who could excel, 510 And such were prais'd who but endeavour'd well: Tho' triumphs were to gen'rals only due, Crowns were reserv'd to grace the soldiers too, Now, they who reach Parnassus' lofty crown, Employ their pains to spurn some others down; 515 And while self-love each jealous writer r
The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems — Alexander Pope, PART III. Ver. 560, etc. · ¶260 · Public domain (US), Project Gutenberg #9800 · source
The "Essay on Criticism" sums up the art of poetry as taught first by Horace, then by Boileau and the eighteenth-century classicists. Though written in heroic couplets, we hardly consider this as a poem but rather as a storehouse of critical maxims. "For fools rush in where angels fear to tread"; "To err is human, to forgive divine"; "A little learning is a dangerous thing,"--these lines, and many
English Literature Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English-Speaking World — William J. Long, CHAPTER IX · ¶914 · Public domain (US), Project Gutenberg #10609 · source
To err is human, to forgive divine.[325-1]
Familiar Quotations A Collection of Passages, Phrases, and Proverbs Traced to Their Sources in Ancient and Modern Literature — John Bartlett, ¶8505 · Public domain (US), Project Gutenberg #27889 · source
record sha256: 710cf107ca54995bdecaa84741e12315a902a23931d07b75319462bec1973e64
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible (WLC), CC BY 4.0