Miscellanies 1.14.59

The Greeks say that after Orpheus and Linus and their most ancient poets, the first to be admired for wisdom were the seven called the Wise Men. Of these four were from Asia: Thales of Miletus, Bias of Priene, Pittacus of Mitylene, and Cleobulus of Lindus; two from Europe: Solon of Athens and Chilon of Sparta. The seventh some say was Periander of Corinth, others Anacharsis the Scythian, others Epimenides the Cretan (whom he knows as a Greek prophet, and whom the apostle Paul mentions in the letter to Titus, speaking thus: “One of them, a prophet of their own, said: Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy bellies; and this testimony is true.” You see how he gives some truth even to the prophets of the Greeks, and is not ashamed, in speaking for the edification and shaming of some, to use Greek poems. At any rate, to the Corinthians too (not only here), discussing the resurrection of the dead, he uses a tragic iambic line, saying: “What is the benefit to me? If the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. Do not be deceived: bad company corrupts good morals”). Others have listed Acusilaus of Argos among the Seven Wise Men, and others Pherecydes of Syros. Plato, instead of Periander, whom he considered unworthy of wisdom because he had been a tyrant, puts in Myson of Chen.