Tertullian
Tertullian (c.160 - c. 240), full name Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullian was a church leader and prolific author during the early years of Christianity. He was one of the Latin Fathers, born at Carthage, the son of a Roman centurion. He was well educated and bred a rhetorician. After conversion to Christianity, he became presbyter of Carthage, and embraced Montanist views, a belief that was later declared heretical. He wrote numerous works, apologetical, polemical, doctrinal, and practical, the last of an ascetic tendency. He was a controversial person within the Church. He is also known as the Father of the Latin Church.Wisdom & Quotes
- It is certain because it is impossible. (Certum est quia impossible.)
- De Carne Cristi (On the flesh of Christ)
- A god does not change his ways.
- The Christian's Defense
- Nothing is more foreign to us Christians than politics.
- The Christian's Defense
- Where our work is, there let our joy be.
- Women's Dress
- Man is one name belonging to every nation upon earth. In them all is one soul though many tongues. Every country has its own language, yet the subjects of which the untutored soul speaks are the same everywhere.
– De testimonio animae (On the testimony of the soul)
- Truth persuades by teaching, but does not teach by persuading.
– Adversus Valentinianos (Against the Valentinians)
- Truth does not blush.
– Adversus Valentinianos (Against the Valentinians)
- It is to be believed because it is absurd.
– Adversus Valentinianos (Against the Valentinians)
- De Carne Cristi (On the flesh of Christ)
- All things will be in danger of being taken in a sense different from their own proper sense, and, whilst taken in that different sense, of losing their proper one, if they are called by a name which differs from their natural designation. Fidelity in names secures the safe appreciation of properties.
– De Carne Cristi (On the flesh of Christ)
- Why lean upon a blind guide, if you have eyes of your own? Why be clothed by one who is naked, if you have put on Christ? Why use the shield of another, when the apostle gives you armour of your own? It would be better for him to learn from you to acknowledge the resurrection of the flesh, than for you from him to deny it; because if Christians must needs deny it, it would be sufficient if they did so from their own knowledge, without any instruction from the ignorant multitude.
– De resurrectione carnis (On the resurrection of the flesh)
- He who flees will fight again.
– De fuga in persecutione (On running away from persecution)
- It is certainly no part of religion to compel religion.
– Ad Scapulam (To Scapula)
- But the Christian verily has distinctly declared this principle, “God is not, if He is not one;” because we more properly believe that that has no existence which is not as it ought to be.
– Adversus Marcionem (Against Marcion)
- We conclude that God is known first through Nature, and then again, more particularly, by doctrine; by Nature in His works, and by doctrine in His revealed word.
– Adversus Marcionem (Against Marcion)
- When God's Spirit descends, then Patience accompanies Him indivisibly.
– De patientia (On patience)
- Notorious, too, are the dealings of heretics with swarms of magicians and charlatans and astrologers and philosophers — all, of course, devotees of speculation. You can judge the quality of their faith from the way they behave. Discipline is an index to doctrine.
– De praescriptione haereticorum (On the prescription of heretics)
- Some men are very bad, and some very good; but yet the souls of all form but one genus: even in the worst there is something good, and in the best there is something bad. ... Just as no soul is without sin, so neither is any soul without seeds of good.
– De anima (On the soul)
- Christians are made, not born.
– Apologeticum (Apology)
- Even when the ray is shot from the sun, it is still part of the parent mass; the sun will still be in the ray, because it is a ray of the sun—there is no division of substance, but merely an extension. Thus Christ is Spirit of Spirit, and God of God, as light of light is kindled.
– Apologeticum (Apology)
- We are not Indian Brahmins or Gymnosophists, who dwell in woods and exile themselves from ordinary human life. We do not forget the debt of gratitude we owe to God, our Lord and Creator; we reject no creature of His hands, though certainly we exercise restraint upon ourselves, lest of any gift of His we make an immoderate or sinful use. So we sojourn with you in the world.
– Apologeticum (Apology)
- But our Lord Christ has surnamed Himself Truth, not Custom. If Christ is always, and prior to all, equally truth is a thing sempiternal and ancient. Let those therefore look to themselves, to whom that is new which is intrinsically old. It is not so much novelty as truth which convicts heresies. Whatever savours of opposition to truth, this will be heresy, even (if it be an) ancient custom.
– De virginibus velandis (On the veiling of virgins)
- The principal crime of the human race, the highest guilt charged upon the world, the whole procuring cause of judgment, is idolatry.
– De idolatria (On Idolatry)
- But everything which is against nature deserves to be branded as monstrous among all men; but with us it is to be condemned also as sacrilege against God, the Lord and Creator of nature.
– De Corona (The Chaplet)
Chung-chang Tung