Wine

Quotes about wine, an alcoholic beverage made from the fermentation of unmodified grape juice. Wine is thought to have originated in present day Soviet Georgia or Iran about 8,000 years ago and adopted into Middle East and Europe. As one of the most popular alcoholic beverages in the Western culture, wine might be referred to alcoholic beverage in other cultures made from other materials.

Sourced

• A meal without wine is like a day without sunshine.
• Tell me what you drink, and I will tell you what you are
• Burgundy makes you think of silly things, Bordeaux makes you talk of them and Champagne makes you do them.
• A man who was fond of wine was offered some grapes at dessert after dinner. 'Much obliged,' said he, pushing the dish away from him, 'but I am not in the habit of taking my wine in pills.'
  • Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, French gastronome, (1755-1826), "The Physiology of Taste"

• Let us have wine and women, mirth and laughter,
  Sermons and soda-water the day after.
  • Lord Byron, Don Juan, Second Canto

• We hear of the conversion of water into wine at the marriage in Cana, as of a miracle. But this conversion is, through the goodness of God, made every day before our eyes. Behold the rain which descends from heaven upon our vineyards, and which incorporates itself with the grapes to be changed into wine; a constant proof that God loves us, and loves to see us happy!
  • Benjamin Franklin, The Posthumous and Other Writings of Benjamin Franklin (1819). p. 290.

Old wine

• Is not old wine wholesomest, old pippins toothsomest, old wood burn brightest, old linen wash whitest? Old soldiers, sweethearts, are surest, and old lovers are soundest.
  • John Webster, Westward Hoe, Act II, scene ii, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

• Alonso of Aragon was wont to say in commendation of age, that age appears to be best in four things,—old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read.
  • Francis Bacon, Apothegms, No. 97, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

• Old wood to burn! Old wine to drink! Old friends to trust! Old authors to read!—Alonso of Aragon was wont to say in commendation of age, that age appeared to be best in these four things.
  • Melchior de Santa Cruz, Floresta Española de Apothegmas o sentencias, etc., ii. 1, 20, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

• What find you better or more honourable than age? Take the preheminence of it in everything,—in an old friend, in old wine, in an old pedigree.
  • Shackerley Marmion (1602–1639), The Antiquary, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

• I love everything that ’s old,—old friends, old times, old manners, old books, old wine.
  • Oliver Goldsmith, She Stoops to Conquer, act i, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

Politicians

• Good wine is a necessity of life for me.
  • Thomas Jefferson.

• Who loves not woman, wine, and song remains a fool his whole life long.
  • Martin Luther

• Wine is inspiring and adds greatly to the joy of living.
  • Napoleon Bonaparte, French emperor, (1769-1821)

Theology

• Vinum bonum laetificat cor hominis - wine gladdens a man's heart
  • Psalms - 104:15

• Drink no longer water but use a little wine for thy stomach's sake and thine often infirmities.
  • 1 Timothy 5:23

• Sorrow can be alleviated by good sleep, a bath and a glass of wine.
  • Thomas Aquinas.

• There is a devil in every berry of the grape.
  • Qur'an.

• Go, eat your food with gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for it is now that God favours what you do.
  • Ecclesiastes 9:7

"And Noah began to be a husbandman, and he planted a vineyard."
- Genesis 9:20.

"I have enjoyed great health at a great age because everyday since I can remember I have consumed a bottle of wine except when I have not felt well. Then I have consumed two bottles." - A Bishop of Seville Baron.

Philosophers

• Vinum incendit iram - wine causes anger.
  • Seneca.

• No thing more excellent nor more valuable than wine was ever granted mankind by God.
  • Plato

"I like best the wine drunk at the cost of others." - Diogenes the Cynic

• God made only water, but man made wine.
  • Victor Hugo

• Wine rejoices the heart of man and joy is the mother of all virtues.
  • Johann Wolfgang van Goethe

• When men drink, then they are rich and successful and win lawsuits and are happy and help their friends. Quickly, bring me a beaker of wine, so that I may wet my mind and say something clever.
  • Aristophanes c. 450 - 385 B.C., Knights [424 B.C.], l. 92

• In vino veritas.
  • a proverb (Latin for In wine, truth) quoted by Alcibiades in Plato's Symposium.

Diogenes was asked what wine he liked best, and he answered as I would have done when he said, "Somebody else's."
Montaigne, French essayist, (1533-1592)

Scientistis

• "Wine is sunlight, held together by water" - Galileo Galilei (Italian polymath scientist and mathematician 1564 – 1642)

• I have often wondered what the vintners buy, one half so precious as the goods they sell
  • – Omar Khayyam, Persian polymath (1048AD - 1123AD)

“Moonlight has pierced the night with her rays; Drink your wine, for you cannot find a better moment; Enjoy yourself and think that one day the moon will shine on the graves of every one of us.” – Omar Khayyam, Persian polymath (1048AD - 1123AD)

Artists

The discovery of a good wine is increasingly better for mankind than the discovery of a new star.
Leonardo da Vinci, Italian artist, (1452-1519)

I feast on wine and bread, and feasts they are.
Michelangelo, Italian painter and sculptor, (1475-1564)

Writers

"Wine... the intellectual part of the meal." - Alexandre Dumas, 1873.

"Wine is the most civilized thing in the world." - Ernest Hemingway.

And that you may the less marvel at my words, Look at the sun's heat that becomes wine when combine with the juice that flows from the vine.
Dante Alighieri, Italian author, (1265-1321)

“Wine is bottled poetry.” - Robert Louis Stevenson

“Wine gives courage and makes men more apt for passion.” - Ovid (Ancient Roman classical Poet and Author of Metamorphoses, 43 BC-17)

• ... good company, good wine, good welcome, can make good people.
  • William Shakespeare, Henry VIII.

• O thou invisible spirit of wine, if thou hast no name to be known by, let us call thee—devil! * * * O, that men should put an enemy to their mouths to steal away their brains; that we should, with joy, revel, pleasure and applause, transform ourselves into beasts!
  • William Shakespeare

• Good wine is a good familiar creature if it well used.
  • William Shakespeare

The only friends who are free from cares are the goblet of wine and a book. Give me wine...that I may for a time forget the cares of the world.
Hafiz (Shams al-Din Mohammed), Persian Poet, (1380-1388)

"Penicillin cures, but wine makes people happy." - Alexander Fleming.

Anonymous

• Life is too short to drink bad wine. - Anonymous

• Like a fine wine I'm not getting older, I'm becoming more complex. - Anonymous

• I only drink on days ending in "y". - Anonymous

• "Reality is an illusion that occurs due to a lack of wine." - Anonymous.

• I cook with wine; sometimes I even add it to the food! - W. C. Fields

Misc

• WINE n. Fermented grape-juice known to the Women's Christian Union as liquor, sometimes as rum.

• Wine, madam, is God's next best gift to man.
  • Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary.

• Once... in the wilds of Afghanistan, I lost my corkscrew, and we were forced to live on nothing but food and water for days.
  • W. C. Fields, My Little Chickadee.

• They are astoundingly vivid, undeflected, radiantly seethingly alive on the palate, not just larger than life, but realer than reality. Drinking them I have been moved to every emotion under the sun: wonder, sadness in the face of such utter beauty, frustration when the wine was so celestially multifaceted I couldn't assimilate all the flavors, shattering excitement at the sheer electricity, helpless yielding at the total seductiveness, tears of gladness, sorrow, and almost rage at one special wine that was so fiercely beautiful I felt I couldn't rise up high enough to meet it.
  • Terry Thiese, Companion Wine Review

• There is no back label with a story on a beer can.
  • Ely Callaway, founder of Callaway Winery

• I made wine out of raisins so I wouldn't have to wait for it to age.
  • Steven Wright

• Wine is the most healthful and most hygienic of beverages
  • Louis Pasteur

• Both to the rich and poor, wine is the happy antidote for sorrow.
  • Euripides

• It is well to remember that there are five reasons for drinking: the arrival of a friend; one's present or future thirst; the excellence of the wine; or any other reason.
  • Latin saying

• Drink wine, and you will sleep well. Sleep, and you will not sin. Avoid sin, and you will be saved. Ergo, drink wine and be saved.
  • Medieval German saying

• 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. So, lets all get drunk and go to Heaven.
  • Brian O'Rourke

• Wine cheereth God and man.
  • Judges 9:13

• Good wine ruins the purse; bad wine ruins the stomach.
  • Spanish saying

• When asked what wines he liked to drink he replied, 'That which belongs to another.'
  • Laertius Diogenes

• The wines that one best remembers are not necessarily the finest that one has ever tasted, and the highest quality may fail to delight so much as some far more humble beverage drunk in more favorable surroundings.
  • H. Warner Allen, from the wine list of Commander's Palace in New Orleans, LA, courtesy of John McDonald, Dallas, TX

• The best use of bad wine is to drive away poor relations.
  • French proverbs

• I rather like bad wine ... one gets so bored with good wine.
  • Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield (1804–1881), Sybil; or, The Two Nations (1845), bk. I, ch. 1

• My dear girl, there are some things that just aren't done, such as drinking Dom Perignon '53 above the temperature of 38 degrees Fahrenheit. That's just as bad as listening to the Beatles without earmuffs!
  • Sean Connery as James Bond, in Goldfinger (1964)

• Sparkling Muscatel. One of the finest wines of Idaho.
  • Waiter (Steve Martin), in The Muppet Movie (1979)

• I was in love with a beautiful blonde once. She drove me to drink; that's the one thing I'm indebted to her for.
  • W. C. Fields, in Never Give a Sucker an Even Break

• What contemptible scoundrel stole the cork from my lunch?
  • Larson E. Whipsnade (W. C. Fields), in You Can't Cheat an Honest Man (1939)

• Sometimes when I reflect on all the wine I drink I feel shamed, then I look into the glass and think about the workers in the winery and all of their hopes and dreams. If I don't drink this wine they might be out of work and their dreams would be shattered. Then I say to myself, It is better that I drink this wine and let their dreams come true than be selfish and worry about my liver.
  • Jack Handy

• In victory I deserve Champagne, in defeat I need it.
  • Napoleon Bonaparte

• I feel sorry for the 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

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

• Champagne is not so much wine; but more an alcopop gone wrong.

• Wine never dies. Instead it lives in the soul of the person who consumes it.
  • Baron Philippe de Rothschild

• People spend too much time tasting wine; not enough time drinking it
  • Andre Tchelistcheff

• Wine is a puzzle yearning to be solved.
  • Aaron B. Sherman