Wine, beer, and spirits quotes - Part 3

Wine opens the heart. It warms the shy poet hidden in the cage of of the ribs. It melts the wax in the ears that music may be heard. It takes the terror from the tongue that truth may be said, or what rhymes marvelously with truth. The soft warm sting on the cheekbones that a ripe Burgundy gives is only the thin outward pervasion of a fine heat within, when the cruel secret smoulder of the wit leaps into clear flame, flame that consumes the sorry rubbish of precaution and cajolery. and

Then mind is full of answers. Then presently, if you have dealt justly with the god, not brutishly, he gives you the completest answer of all--sleep.

CHRISTOPHER MORLEY, AMERICAN WRITER

Wine to the poet is a winged steed;

Those who drink water gain but little speed.

NICAENTUS, GREEK EPIGRAMATIC POET

Assist, almighty wine, for thou alone hast power,

Assist while with just praise I thee adore.

Thou art the world's great soul, that heavenly fire,

Which dost our half-kinded mass inspire.

A friend and a bottle is all my design;

He has no room for treason that's top-full of wine. and

I often wonder what the vintners buy

One half so precious as the stuff they sell. and

A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,

A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread - and Thou

Beside me singing in the Wilderness -

Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow! OMAR KHAYYAM

EDWARD FITZGERALD

There with the wine before you, you will tell of many things. and

It warms the blood, adds luster to the eyes,

And wine and love have ever been allies.

OVID

Three are the things I shall never attain--Envy, content and sufficient champagne.

DOROTHY PARKER, AMERICAN WRITER, HUMORIST

There are two reasons for drinking wine; one is when you are thirsty, to cure it; the other, when you are not thirsty, to prevent it...Prevention is always better than a cure.

THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK, ENGLISH NOVELIST AND POET

Wine is an old man's milk.

ANTONIO PEREZ, SPANISH STATESMAN

I regard those as wise who employ old wine freely and study old stories.

PLAUTUS, LATIN DRAMATIST

It has become quite a common proverb that in wine there is truth. and

Pliny had a good answer when someone asked him, "What is the best kind of wine?" He would reply, "The best kind of wine is that which is most pleasant to him who drinks it."

PLINY THE ELDER, ROMAN SCHOLAR

Wine what the wit, improves its native force,

And gives pleasant flavor to discourse.

JOHN POMFRET, ENGLISH POET

Wine in itself is an excellent thing.

POPE PIUS XII

Old wine has the charm and savour of a remembrance. Like the latter, if comes to us form the past, decanted from its mires and bonds--clear, brilliant, aureoled with joy and fragrance. Like remembrance, also, it knows how to unlock for us the springs of a dream.

PIERRE POUPON, FRENCH WRITER

The grape absorbs the sun, the wine puts the sunshine into men's hearts; without it the world would begin to look for vices to take place of conviviality.

NINAS WILCOX PUTNAM, AMERICAN WRITER

Never did a great man hate good wine.

FRANCOIS RABELAIS, FRENCH HUMORIST AND SATIRIST

Value wine like women, for maturity not age. and

When the cellar is empty a man's all is gone. and

Good wine at supper makes an appetite at breakfast. and

There are many dreams in a bottle of Burgundy.

CYRUS REDDING

You can have too much champagne to drink but you can never have enough.

ELMER RICE, AMERICAN PLAYWRIGHT

Wine is a perfect cure for heaviness and sorrow.

(LUCIUS) SENECA, ROMAN STATESMAN AND PHILOSPHER

Into crystal cup the dusky wine pour, and, musing at so rich a shrine, watch the star that haunts its ruddy gloom. and

Wine gives all and gives forever. and

He who clinks his cup with mine,

Adds a glory to the wine.

GEORGE STERLING, AMERICAN POET (1869-1926)

A bottle of good wine, like a good act, shines ever in retrospect. and

..the stirring sunlight, and the growing vine, and the vats and bottles in the cavern, made a pleasant music for the mind. and

Those lodes and pockets of earth, more precious than the precious ores, that yield inimitable fragrance and soft fire, those virtuous Bonanzas where the soil has sublimated under sun and stars to something finer, and the wine is bottled poetry...and

Fifteen men on the dead man's chest

Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum!

Drink and the Devil had done for the rest--

Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum!

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, SCOTTISH ESSAYIST, NOVELIST AND POET

Day and night my thoughts incline

To the blandishments of wine;

Jars were made to drain; I think,

Wine, I know, was made to drink. and

When I die, (the day be far)

Should the potter make a jar

Out of this poor clay of mine,

Let the jar be filled with wine.

RICHARD HENRY STODDARD

This wine should be eaten, it is too good to be drunk.

JONATHAN SWIFT, ENGLISH SATIRIST

A waltz and a glass of wine invite an encore.

JOHANN STRAUSS, AUSTRIAN COMPOSER AND ORCHESTRA CONDUCTOR

I am a wine drinker, I drink every day of my life. I believe in the effect of good wine to relax one.

LEOPLOD STOKOWSKI, AMERICAN ORCHESTRA CONDUCTOR

Grudge myself good wine? As soon grudge my horse corn. and

No wine may drink the proud Paynim,

And so I'd rather not be him. and

Sip your spirits and cure your cold, but I will take Port that will cure all things, even a bad character. For thee was never a Port drinker who lacked friends to speak for him.

WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERY, ENGLISH NOVELIST

Anyone who know his history... must surely know his wines.

ARNOLD TOYNBEE, BRITISH HISTORIAN

With age a richer life begins,

The spirit mellows:

Ripe age gives tone to violins,

Wine and good fellows.

JOHN TOWNSEND TROWBRIDGE, AMERICAN WRITER

Wines are an important part of the enjoyment of life.

RUDY VALLEE, AMERICAN SINGER AND BAND LEADER

(Wine is) the divine juice of September.

VOLTAIRE, FRENCH WRITER

My manner of living is plain and I do not mean to be put out of it. A glass of wine and a bit of mutton are always ready, and such as are content to partake of that are always ready, and such as are content to partake of that are always welcome. Those who expect more will be disappointed.

GEORGE WASHINGTON, AMERICAN STATESMAN

You Americans have the loveliest wine in the world, you know, but you don't realize it. You call them domestic and that's enough to start trouble anywhere.

H.G. WELLS, BRITISH NOVELIST AND HISTORIAN

Wine...is one of the noblest cordials in nature.

JOHN WESLEY, FOUNDER OF METHODISM

Educated people know wine is good for both their health and welfare.

CASPER W. WEINBERGER, FORMER SECRETARY OF US DEPT OF HEALTH EDUCATION AND WELFARE

To eat, to drink and to be merry.

ECCLESIATES 8:15

Eat thy bread with joy and drink thy wine with a merry heart.

ECCLESIASTES 9:7

When I read about the evils of drinking, I gave up reading.

HENNY YOUNGMAN

A feast is made for laughter and wine maketh merry.

ECCLESIASTES 10:19

Foresake not an old friend, for the new is not comparable to him. A new friend is as new as wind: when it is old, thou shalt drink it with pleasure.

ECCLESIASTICUS 9:10

Wine was created from the beginning to make men joyful, and not to make men drunk. Wine drunk with moderation is the joy of soul and the heart.

ECCESIASTICUS 31:35-36

Wine which cheereth God and man.

JUDGES 9:13

Give...wine unto those that be of heavy hearts.

PROVERBS 31:6

Wine maketh glad the heart of man.

PSALMS 104:15

"Better Come Drink Wine With Me"

Don't go hide in the mountains--

you'll only come to hate it.

Your teeth will ache with the chill of dawn water,

your face will smart from the bite of the night frost.

Go off fishing and winds will blow up from the cove;

return from gathering firewood to find snow all over the cliffs.

Better come drink wine with me;

face to face we'll get mellowly, mellowly drunk.

Don't goof off and be a farmer

you'll only make yourself miserable.

Come spring and you'll be plowing the lean soil,

twilight and it's time to feed the skinny ox.

Again and again you'll be hit for government taxes,

but seldom will you meet up with a year of good crops.

Better come drink wine with me;

togther we'll get quietly, quietly drunk.

Don't go climbing up to the blue clouds--*

the blue clouds are rife with passion and hate,

everyone a wise man, bragging of knowledge and vision,

flattening each other in the scramble for merit and power.

Fish get chowdered because they swallow the bait;

moths burn up when they bumble into the lamp.

Better come drink wine with me;

let yourself go, get roaring, roaring drunk.

Don't go into the realm of red dust--

it wears out a person's spirit and strength.

You war with each other like the two horns of a snail,

end up with one ox-hair worth of gain.

Put out the fire that burns in your rage,

stop whetting the knife that hides in a smile.

Better come drink wine with me,

we'll lie down peacefully, merrily, merrily drunk.

* according to the translator (Burton Watson), verses 3 and 4 speak allegorically about the worlds of government (blue clouds) and the marketplace (red dust), eternally opposed and at war.

P Chü-I, (CHINESE POET: 772-846)

The best wine...that goeth down sweetly causing the lips of those that are asleep to sleep to speak.

SONG OF SOLOMON 7:9

Drunkenness is not the wine's fault, but the man's.

ANONYMOUS--CHINESE PROVERB

God, in His goodness sent the grapes

To cheer both great and small;

Little fools will drink too much,

And great fools not at all.

ANONYMOUS

Good wine is an aid to digestion and a promoter of good cheer. I don't think anyone will find a sound argument against the moderate use of it.

GEORGE ADE--AMERICAN HUMORIST AND PLAYWRIGHT

I hail with joy-- for I am a temperance man and a friend of temperance--I hail with joy the efforts that are being made to raise wine in the country. I believe that when you have everywhere cheap, pure, unadulterated wine, you will no longer have need for either prohibitory or license laws.

LOUIS AGASSIZ, AMERICAN NATURALIST

Wine is one thing, drunkenness another.

ROBERT BURTON, ENGLISH CLERGYMAN AND PHILOSOPHICAL WRITER (1577-1640)

I heartily favor the use of wine and its sensible use as a beverage as a help in the digestion of the evening meal. I have found the use of wine in my own life one of great benefit. I truly believe that if the American public were educated in the use of wine both as a mild stimulant and as an aid to digestion, the national concern about "hard liquors" would solve itself.

CHARLES WAKEFIELD CADMAN, AMERICAN MUSICIAN AND COMPOSER

Wine taken in moderation, aids digestion. It is festive and cheerful, and I have always believed that there should be pleasure, above all, in eating.

GAYELORD HAUSER, AMERICAN DIET, HEALTH AND BEAUTY EXPONENT

Wine seems to have been a contaminant of mankind as far back as books and tradition reach. It appears to have been what man has always considered the principle and finest product of the grape...Wine always has, and probably always will, grace boards of refinement and gentle conduct. and

Ordinary wine is used as a common and usual beverage by multitiudes of our people instead of water. The Saviour changed water into wine at the behest of His Virgin Mother at the wedding feast; it was used at the Last Supper and, as a matter of common knowledge, it is a part of the very core of the most sacred religious rites of both Christians and other faiths.

JUDGE JACKSON, FORMERLY OF U.S. COURT OF CUSTOMS & PATENTS APPEAL

Moderation in the drinking of good wine often is conducive to health and happiness. Wine-drinking peoples are never - or seldom - intemperate.

CHANNING POLLOCK, AMERICAN PLAYWRIGHT (1880-1946)

The cheapness of wine seems to be the cause, not of drunkenness, but of sobriety.

ADAM SMITH, SCOTTISH ECONOMIST

from "Tortilla Flat"

Two gallons is a great deal of wine, even for two paisanos. Spiritually the jugs may be graduated thus: Just below the shoulder of the first bottle, serious and concentrated conversation. Two inches farther down, sweetly sad memory. Three inches more, thoughts of old and satisfactory loves. An inch, thoughts of old and bitter loves. Bottom of the first jug, general and undirected sadness. Shoulder of the second jug, black, unholy despondency. Two fingers down, a song of death or longing. A thumb, every other song each one knows. The graduations stop here, for the trail splits and there is no certainty. From this point on anything can happen.

JOHN STEINBECK (AMERICAN WRITER: 1902-1968)

A moderate use of wine is the best antidote against alcoholism.

PIERRE VIALA, MEMBER OF THE FRENCH ACADEMY OF SCIENCES; VITICULTURIST

The proper tempo for wine drinking is leisurely. It is almost meditative. It aids in digestion, supplies needed vitamins and carbohydrates and suffuses the whole being with a warmth and friendliness not to be captured by any other means. and

A people who drink wine, who prefer wine to spirits, are a temperate people. and

Mounting taxes laid on wine drive the temperate man's beverage from his table. and

He who drinks spirits wants to forget;

He who drinks wine wants to remember. and

Drinking a little wine with meals dulls the edge of worry and banishes anger. Worry and anger cause more high blood pressure than the general run of doctors realized.

RICHARDSON WRIGHT

I feel sorry for people who don't drink. When they wake up in the morning, that's as good as they're going to feel all day.

FRANK SINATRA

The problem with some people is that when they aren't drunk, they're sober.

WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS

You're not drunk if you can lie on the floor without holding on.

DEAN MARTIN

Drunk is feeling sophisticated when you can't say it.

ANONYMOUS

Time is never wasted when you're wasted all the time.

CATHERINE ZANDONELLA

Abstainer: a weak person who yields to the temptation of denying himself a pleasure.

AMBROSE BIERCE

Reality is an illusion that occurs due to lack of alcohol.

ANONYMOUS

I never drink anything stronger than gin before breakfast. and

A woman drove me to drink and I didn't even have the decency to thank her. and

What contemptible scoundrel has stolen the cork to my lunch?

W.C. FIELDS

Beauty lies in the hands of the beer holder.

ANONYMOUS

If God had intended us to drink beer, He would have given us stomachs.

DAVID DAYE

Work is the curse of the drinking classes.

OSCAR WILDE

Life is a waste of time, time is a waste of life, so get wasted all of the time and have the time of your life.

ANONYMOUS

I'd rather have a bottle in front of me, than a frontal lobotomy.

TOM WAITS

24 hours in a day, 24 beers in a case. Coincidence?

STEPHEN WRIGHT via WILLY & ETHEL

When we drink, we get drunk. When we get drunk, we fall asleep. When we fall asleep, we commit no sin. When we commit no sin, we go to heaven. Sooooo, let's all get drunk, and go to heaven.

BRIAN O'ROURKE

You can't be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline -- it helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer.

FRANK ZAPPA

If you ever reach total enlightenment while drinking beer, I bet it makes beer shoot out your nose.

DEEP THOUGHT, JACK HANDY

Without question, the greatest invention in the history of mankind is beer. Oh, I grant you that the wheel was also a fine invention, but The wheel does not go nearly as well with pizza. and

Not all chemicals are bad. Without chemicals such as hydrogen and oxygen, for example, there would be no way to make water, a vital ingredient in beer.

DAVE BARRY

Listen, Kid, go bring us something

decent to drink, you heard the lady,

she's smashed as a grape and wants

good old Falernian bubbly, the best,

Get out, water, you kill the wine,

move, go chase the squares instead,

over here we do only serious drinking.

GAIUS VALERIUS CATULLUS (ROMAN POET: 84-54 BC?) translated by Carl Sesar

The problem with the world is that everyone is a few drinks behind.

HUMPHREY BOGART

I would kill everyone in this room for a drop of sweet beer.

HOMER SIMPSON

I drink to make other people interesting.

GEORGE JEAN NATHAN

Give me a woman who loves beer and I will conquer the world.

KAISER WILHELM