My advice to people today is as follows: if you take the game of life seriously, if you take your nervous system seriously, if you take your sense organs seriously, if you take the energy process seriously, you must turn on, tune in, and drop out.
—Timothy Leary, 1966Quotes
Thanks be to God: since my leaving drinking of wine, I do find myself much better and do mind my business better, and do spend less money, and less time lost in idle company.
—Samuel Pepys, 1662Give me chastity and continence, but not just now.
—Saint Augustine, 397Drunkenness is the very sepulcher / Of man’s wit and his discretion.
—Geoffrey Chaucer, c. 1390That which the sober man keeps in his breast, the drunken man lets out at the lips. Astute people, when they want to ascertain a man’s true character, make him drunk.
—Martin Luther, 1569Drinking with women is as unnatural as scolding with ’em.
—William Wycherley, 1675Some writers take to drink, others take to audiences.
—Gore Vidal, 1981It is impossible to live pleasurably without living wisely, well, and justly, and impossible to live wisely, well, and justly without living pleasurably.
—Epicurus, c. 300 BCModeration in all things.
—Terence, 166 BCAs far as I can see, the history of experimental art in the twentieth century is intimately bound up with the experience of intoxification.
—Will Self, 1994A man who exposes himself when he is intoxicated has not the art of getting drunk.
—Samuel Johnson, 1779Drink does not drown care but waters it, and makes it grow faster.
—Benjamin Franklin, 1749Sobriety diminishes, discriminates, and says no; drunkenness expands, unites, and says yes.
—William James, 1902