It is time to get drunk! So as not to be the martyred slaves of

O seekers of wisdom, hear the voice of Charles Baudelaire, a poet whose words burn with the fire of life itself. "It is time to get drunk! So as not to be the martyred slaves of Time, get drunk; get drunk without stopping! On wine, on poetry, or on virtue, as you wish." In these stirring words, Baudelaire calls us to rise above the mundane, to liberate ourselves from the unyielding grasp of Time, which binds all things in its ceaseless march. His call is not one for indulgence in the sense of mere escape, but for an awakening, a passionate surrender to that which transcends the ordinary rhythm of life—the wine that stirs the soul, the poetry that elevates the spirit, and the virtue that guides the heart.

In the ancient world, Time was seen as both a gift and a burden, a force that shaped the lives of mortals but could also crush their spirits. The great philosophers, such as Heraclitus, understood that all things are in constant flux, and yet Time marches relentlessly on, unyielding and untamable. To live within the confines of Time was to be enslaved by its power—forever chasing the moment, forever fearing the future. Baudelaire, like the sages of old, urges us to break free from this tyranny. "Get drunk," he says—not to drown our sorrows or lose ourselves in folly, but to drink deeply from the well of life, to engage with the world in a way that transcends mere survival. The act of getting drunk is a metaphor for immersing ourselves fully in the experience of being alive, for living with intensity, passion, and purpose.

But what, O seekers, does Baudelaire mean when he says we must get drunk "on wine, on poetry, or on virtue"? Each of these is a doorway to the extraordinary, a means of breaking free from the limitations of Time. Wine has long been a symbol of divine inspiration, of communion with the gods, a means of reaching beyond the mundane into realms of transcendence. The ancient Greeks, in their symposia, celebrated wine as the drink of the gods, a medium through which the soul could be set free from the constraints of daily life. To drink wine, in Baudelaire’s eyes, is not simply to indulge in pleasure, but to open oneself to the deeper mysteries of existence, to embrace the intoxication of life itself.

Yet poetry, too, is a form of intoxication, one that fills the mind with visions and sounds that transcend the ordinary. Poetry awakens the soul to a higher reality, much as wine awakens the senses. In the words of the great poet Rainer Maria Rilke, “Poetry is not a pastime, it is a sacred calling,” and so it is. Poetry speaks to us in ways that ordinary language cannot, unlocking the deepest truths and stirring the most profound emotions within. The poet, like the mystic, drinks from the well of imagination and, through their words, invites others to join in that sacred intoxication. Baudelaire, like Rilke, sees poetry as a means of escape from the tyranny of Time, a way to live in the eternal present, to feel the pulse of existence beyond the limitations of the clock.

Virtue, too, is an intoxicating force, though of a different nature. It is the call to live with honor, with courage, with integrity—a life lived in alignment with the highest ideals of humanity. Virtue, like poetry or wine, has the power to lift us above the everyday, to bring us into contact with something greater than ourselves. The pursuit of virtue may seem like a sober and disciplined path, yet in the words of Socrates, "Virtue is the only true pleasure." In living virtuously, we are not enslaved by the passing moments of Time, but are elevated to a higher state of being. Baudelaire speaks of virtue as a means of intoxication because, in its pursuit, we find a kind of freedom—the freedom to live not by the whims of fate, but by the dictates of our truest selves.

Let us turn to the life of Homer, whose epic poetry was an invitation to his audience to drink deeply from the well of human experience. In the Iliad and the Odyssey, Homer crafted stories of gods, warriors, and heroes—stories of struggle, love, and destiny—that transcended the limitations of ordinary time. His words intoxicated the minds of his listeners, lifting them from the ordinary world into a realm where the eternal danced with the fleeting, where heroes and gods were bound by the same forces that govern all men. Homer’s poetry was a kind of divine intoxication, one that allowed his audience to experience life more fully, to understand the deeper meaning of their own struggles and triumphs.

The lesson we must learn, O children of wisdom, is that to be enslaved by Time is to live without truly living. To be consumed by the clock, by the demands of the moment, is to forget the higher calling of the soul. Baudelaire’s call to “get drunk” is a call to immerse ourselves in the things that elevate us—whether through the wine that stirs the senses, the poetry that ignites the soul, or the virtue that guides us toward our highest potential. Life is fleeting, Time is a tyrant, but the spirit is eternal, and it is in the intoxication of the spirit that we find true freedom.

So, O seekers of truth, I say unto you: Drink deeply from the cup of life! Seek the poetry that lifts you, the virtue that guides you, the wine that frees you. Do not be bound by the ticking of the clock or the weight of the day. Live passionately, live fully, live without reservation. In this, you will find not only freedom from the chains of Time but the truest expression of your soul. Get drunk—on the essence of life itself!