Laudator Temporis Acti

Greek Anthology 11.23 (by Antipater of Sidon or Thessalonica; tr. W.R. Paton, with his note):

Men learned in the stars say I am short-lived.
I am, Seleucus, but I care not.
There is one road down to Hades for all, and if mine is quicker,
I shall see Minos all the sooner.
Let us drink, for this is very truth, that wine is a horse for the road,
while foot-travellers take a by-path to Hades.<sup>3

3</sup>He will go by the royal road and mounted (on wine); the pedestrians are those who do not drink.

ὠκύμορόν με λέγουσι δαήμονες ἀνέρες ἄστρων·
   εἰμὶ μέν, ἀλλ᾽ οὔ μοι τοῦτο, Σέλευκε, μέλει.
εἰς ἀίδην μία πᾶσι καταίβασις· εἰ δὲ ταχίων
   ἡμετέρη, Μίνω θᾶσσον ἐποψόμεθα.
πίνωμεν καὶ δὴ γὰρ ἐτήτυμον, εἰς ὁδὸν ἵππος
   οἶνος, ἐπεὶ πεζοῖς ἀτραπὸς εἰς ἀίδην.

Robert A. Rohland, "Highway to Hell: AP 11.23 = Antipater of Thessalonica 38 G-P," Mnemosyne 72 (2019) 459-470 (at 460):

This paper argues that the meaning of the last couplet becomes clearer, if it is understood as a playful allusion to a passage from Odyssey 11: as Antipater is faced with a prophecy to die young like Homer's Achilles, he looks for the one method that allows for the speediest and most sympotic katabasis in Homer and finds it in the wine-drinking of Odysseus' comrade Elpenor.