At first sight this would seem to imply that it is false economy to use wine
bottles more than once, and that the saying means the same as, for example,
Penny wise, pound foolish. But this is not so. The real meaning is that are
out of keeping with each other. To play dance music at a funeral is to put new
wine into old bottles.

Let us consider first the source of the saying, which is Matthew, ix, 17:

> ‘Neither do men put new wine into old bottles: else the bottles break, and
the wine runneth out and the bottles perish; but they put new wine into new
bottles, and both are preserved.’

These bottles, of course, were not made of glass, but from the skin of goats.
Once the wineskin had been stretched by fermenting wine, it was liable of
burst when new wine was put into it.

The above quotation does not bring out the full meaning; the lesson is not
complete without these two proceeding verses.

> Jesus asked: ‘Can friends at a wedding mourn, so long as the bridegroom is
beside them?’ Than he said that a piece of new cloth should not be sewn on an
old coat, because it will shrink and make the tear worse.

Thus, when taken together, the three verses mean that we cannot mix things
that will not harmonize with each other, just as oil will not mix with water.