On Repentance

Tertullian of Carthage · c. 203 AD

Ante-Nicene Fathers (Roberts–Donaldson), Roberts, Donaldson, and Coxe (eds.), Ante-Nicene Fathers, Buffalo: Christian Literature Publishing, 1885–1887; digitized by CCEL.

Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus; the first great Latin Christian writer. A North African of Carthage, trained in rhetoric and law; coined much of the Latin theological vocabulary the West later inherited (Trinitas, persona, substantia). His pre-Montanist works are widely cited and respected; his later embrace of the New Prophecy (Montanism) places him outside the catalogue of formally venerated saints, though he is treated honourably as a witness and theologian.

Contents

1. Of Heathen Repentance.
2. True Repentance a Thing Divine, Originated by God, and Subject to His Laws.
3. Sins May Be Divided into Corporeal and Spiritual. Both Equally Subject, If Not to Human, Yet to Divine Investigation and Punishment.
4. Repentance Applicable to All the Kinds of Sin. To Be Practised Not Only, Nor Chiefly, for the Good It Brings, But Because God Commands It.
5. Sin Never to Be Returned to After Repentance.
6. Baptism Not to Be Presumptously Received. It Requires Preceding Repentance, Manifested by Amendment of Life.
7. Of Repentance, in the Case of Such as Have Lapsed After Baptism.
8. Examples from Scripture to Prove the Lord's Willingness to Pardon.
9. Concerning the Outward Manifestations by Which This Second Repentance is to Be Accompanied.
10. Of Men's Shrinking from This Second Repentance and Exomologesis, and of the Unreasonableness of Such Shrinking.
11. Further Strictures on the Same Subject.
12. Final Considerations to Induce to Exomologesis.
13. Elucidations.