One of themselves, even a prophet of their own, said, The Cretians are alway liars, evil beasts, slow bellies.
Ver. 12. Even a prophet of their own] Epimenides, the poet, who by his countrymen the Cretians was counted a prophet, and had divine honours done to him after his death. This uncircumcised poet Paul brings here into the temple, as before he had done Aratus, Acts 17:28, and Menander, 1 Corinthians 15:33 .
The Cretians are always liars] So were the Carthaginians, Tyriique bilingues. a The French had so often deceived the English that such as they mean to deceive they call by a common byword, Les Anglois, The English. The Cretians were loud liars, even to a proverb. Of Dolon, Homer saith, that he had an art in lying. But Eudaemon Joannes (that Cretian demoniac) wins the whetstone from all his countrymen, while he blusheth not to tell the world in print that these are the doctrines and practices of the Protestants, to worship no God, to frame our religion to the times, to pretend the public cause to our private lusts, to break our words as we see good for our purpose, to cover deadly hatred under fair flatteries, to confirm tyranny by shedding the blood of innocents. (Eudaemon Joannes contra Casaub.) Evil beasts, cruel as well as crafty. These two are seldom separated; as some write of the asp, that he never wanders alone without his companion; and as the Scripture speaks of those birds of prey and desolation, Isaiah 34:16; "None of them wanteth his mate."
Slow bellies] That is, given to sloth and idleness, and luxurious gluttons.
a Fides Punica. Virgil. Cres semper mendax, mala bellua, et helluo deses. Cretizare cum Cretensib. vide Erasm. Adag. ισκε ψευσεα πολλα λεγειν ετυμοισιν ομοια. Hom.