Tertullian, Prescription against Heretics 30

Where was Marcion then, that Pontic shipowner and student of Stoicism? Where was Valentinus, the follower of Platonism? The record shows they were not always what they became; they appeared around the reign of Antoninus, and at first they accepted Catholic teaching in the Roman church under the blessed bishop Eleutherius. Their restless curiosity drove them on, a curiosity that even made their fellow believers avoid them, until they were expelled not once but twice. Marcion, who had brought two hundred sestertii to the church, was finally consigned to permanent separation, and the pair proceeded to spread the poison of their doctrines.

Later Marcion confessed repentance and, meeting the condition imposed on him, was to receive peace if he restored to the church the others he had taught for destruction; but death cut him off first. It was necessary for heresies to exist. That does not make heresies good, as if evil were not also necessary. The Lord had to be betrayed, yet woe to the betrayer; let no one cite this necessity to defend heresy.

If we must trace the line of Apelles, he is no more ancient than Marcion, his founder and forerunner. Apelles fell for a woman, abandoned Marcionite continence, and fled from the eyes of the most holy master Alexander to Alexandria. Years later he returned, no better, except that he was no longer a Marcionite, and he fastened onto another woman, the virgin Philumene, whom I mentioned earlier. She turned out to be a monstrous prostitute, and, caught in her spell, he wrote the phaneroseis he learned from her.

People still alive remember these men, including their own disciples and successors, so they cannot deny being their heirs. Even their own works convict them, as the Lord said. If Marcion separated the New Testament from the Old, he is later than what he separated; he could not separate them unless they had first been united. United before, separated after, the separator is shown to be the later party. Likewise Valentinus, by expounding differently and 'correcting,' proves that whatever he corrects was flawed beforehand. These are the most prominent and frequent adulterers of the truth.

Then there are Nigidius, whoever he is, Hermogenes, and many others still walking about perverting God's ways. Let them show me from what authority they sprang. If they preach another god, how do they use that god's own things, letters, and names against the very one they preach? If they preach the same God, how do they do it differently? Let them prove they are new apostles: let them say Christ descended again, taught again, was crucified again, died again, rose again. That is how the apostles operated, and they received power to work the same signs he did. I want to see their powers produced; unless, of course, you count their supreme power, by which they perversely imitate the apostles: the apostles made the dead live, these men make the living dead.