Love versus the Bottle

Sweet Chloe advised me, in accents divine,
The joys of the bowl to surrender :
Nor lose in the turbid excesses of wine
Delights more ecstatic and tender ;
She bade me no longer in vineyards to bask,
Or stagger at orgies, the dupe of a flask,
For the sigh of a sot's but the scent of the cask,
And a bubble the bliss of the bottle.

To a soul that's exhausted, or sterile, or dry,
The juice of the grape may be wanted ;
But mine is revived by a love-beaming eye,
And with Fancy's gay flowerets enchanted.
O who but an owl would a garland entwine
Of Bacchus's ivy — and myrtle resign ?
Yield the odours of love for the vapours of wine,
And Chloe's kind kiss for a bottle !