1 Esdras 3:17-19

New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised

¹⁷ They said to them, ‘Explain to us what you have written.’

The Speech about Wine

Then the first, who had spoken of the strength of wine, began and said: ¹⁸ ‘Gentlemen, how is wine the strongest? It leads astray the minds of all who drink it. ¹⁹ It makes equal the mind of the king and the orphan, of the slave and the free, of the poor and the rich.