Drink does not drown care but waters it, and makes it grow faster.
—Benjamin Franklin, 1749Quotes
Give me chastity and continence, but not just now.
—Saint Augustine, 397My 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, 1966There are two things that will be believed of any man whatsoever, and one of them is that he has taken to drink.
—Booth Tarkington, 1914Drugs, cataplasms, and whiskey are stupid substitutes for the dignity and potency of divine mind and its efficacy to heal.
—Mary Baker Eddy, 1908That 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, 1569Better sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian.
—Herman Melville, 1851There was a great deal of drinking among us but little drunkenness. We all seemed to feel that Prohibition was a personal affront and that we had a moral duty to undermine it.
—Elizabeth Anderson, 1969It 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 BCThe pleasure we hold in esteem for the course of our lives ought to have a greater share of our time dedicated to it; we should refuse no occasion nor omit any opportunity of drinking, and always have it in our minds.
—Michel de Montaigne, 1580I used to do drugs. I still do, but I used to, too.
—Mitch Hedberg, 1999Some writers take to drink, others take to audiences.
—Gore Vidal, 1981Whoever gulps down wine as a horse gulps down water is called a Scythian.
—Athenaeus, c. 230