Hoyt & Roberts, comps. Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations. 1922.
Intemperance
Beware the deadly fumes of that insane elation
Which rises from the cup of mad impiety,
And go, get drunk with that divine intoxication
Which is more sober far than all sobriety.
Wm. R. Alger—Oriental Poetry. The Sober Drunkenness.
Man, being reasonable, must get drunk;
The best of life is but intoxication:
Glory, the grape, love, gold, in these are sunk
The hopes of all men and of every nation;
Without their sap, how branchless were the trunk
Of life’s strange tree, so fruitful on occasion:
But to return,—Get very drunk; and when
You wake with headache, you shall see what then.
Byron—Don Juan. Canto II. St. 179.
Libidinosa etenim et intemperans adolescentia effœtum corpus tradit senectuti.
A sensual and intemperate youth hands over a worn-out body to old age.
Cicero—De Senectute. IX.
Ha! see where the wild-blazing Grog-Shop appears,
As the red waves of wretchedness swell,
How it burns on the edge of tempestuous years
The horrible Light-House of Hell!
M’Donald Clarke—The Rum Hole.
All learned, and all drunk!
Cowper—The Task. Bk. IV. L. 478.
Gloriously drunk, obey the important call.
Cowper—The Task. Bk. IV. L. 510.
He calls drunkenness an expression identical with ruin.
Diogenes Laertius—Lives of the Philosophers. Pythagoras. VI.
Then hasten to be drunk, the business of the day.
Dryden—Cymon and Iphigenia. L. 407.
Petition me no petitions, Sir, to-day;
Let other hours be set apart for business,
To-day it is our pleasure to be drunk;
And this our queen shall be as drunk as we.
Henry Fielding—Tom Thumb the Great. Act I. Sc. 2.
He that is drunken***
Is outlawed by himself; all kind of ill
Did with his liquor slide into his veins.
Herbert—The Temple. The Church Porch. St. 6.
Shall I, to please another wine-sprung minde,
Lose all mine own? God hath giv’n me a measure
Short of His can and body; must I find
A pain in that, wherein he finds a pleasure?
Herbert—The Temple. The Church Porch. St. 7.
Quid non ebrietas designat? Operta recludit;
Spes jubet esse ratas; in prælia trudit inermem.
What does drunkenness not accomplish? It discloses secrets, it ratifies hopes, and urges even the unarmed to battle.
Horace—Epistles. I. 5. 16.
Touch the goblet no more!
It will make thy heart sore
To its very core!
Longfellow—Christus. The Golden Legend. Pt. I.
Soon as the potion works, their human count’nance,
Th’ express resemblance of the gods, is chang’d
Into some bruitish form of wolf or bear,
Or ounce or tiger, hog, or bearded goat,
All other parts remaining as they were;
And they, so perfect in their misery,
Not once perceive their foul disfigurement.
Milton—Comus. L. 64.
And when night
Darkens the streets, then wander forth the sons
Of Belial, flown with insolence and wine.
Milton—Paradise Lost. Bk. I. L. 500.
In vain I trusted that the flowing bowl
Would banish sorrow, and enlarge the soul.
To the late revel, and protracted feast,
Wild dreams succeeded, and disorder’d rest.
Prior—Solomon. Bk. II. L. 106.
Nihil aliud est ebrietas quam voluntaria insania.
Drunkenness is nothing but voluntary madness.
Seneca—Epistolæ Ad Lucilium. LXXXIII.
O monstrous! but one half-penny-worth of bread to this intolerable deal of sack!
Henry IV. Pt. I. Act II. Sc. 4. L. 591.
Sweet fellowship in shame!
One drunkard loves another of the name.
Love’s Labour’s Lost. Act IV. Sc. 3. L. 48.
Boundless intemperance
In nature is a tyranny, it hath been
Th’ untimely emptying of the happy throne,
And fall of many kings.
Macbeth. Act IV. Sc. 3. L. 66.
And now, in madness,
Being full of supper and distempering draughts,
Upon malicious bravery, dost thou come
To start my quiet.
Othello. Act I. Sc. 1. L. 98.
O God, that men should put an enemy in their mouths to steal away their brains! that we should, with joy, pleasance, revel, and applause, transform ourselves into beasts!
Othello. Act II. Sc. 3. L. 293.
I will ask him for my place again; he shall tell me, I am a drunkard! Had I as many mouths as Hydra, such an answer would stop them all. To be now a sensible man, by and by a fool, and presently a beast!
Othello. Act II. Sc. 3. L. 305.
Every inordinate cup is unblessed and the ingredient is a devil.
Othello. Act II. Sc. 3. L. 309.
I told you, sir, they were red-hot with drinking;
So full of valour that they smote the air
For breathing in their faces; beat the ground
For kissing of their feet.
Tempest. Act IV. Sc. 1. L. 171.
What’s a drunken man like, fool?
Like a drowned man, a fool and a madman: one draught above heat makes him a fool; the second mads him; and a third drowns him.
Twelfth Night. Act I. Sc. 5. L. 136.
Drunkenness is an immoderate affection and use of drink. That I call immoderation that is besides or beyond that order of good things for which God hath given us the use of drink.
Jeremy Taylor—Holy Lining. Of Drunkenness. Ch. II. Pt. 2.
The wine of Love is music,
And the feast of Love is song:
And when Love sits down to the banquet,
Love sits long:
*****
Sits long and rises drunken,
But not with the feast and the wine;
He reeleth with his own heart,
That great, rich Vine.
James Thomson—The Vine.
A drunkard clasp his teeth and not undo ’em,
To suffer wet damnation to run through ’em.
Cyril Tourneur—The Revenger’s Tragedy. Act III. Sc. 1.