Tertullian — Against Marcion 1.27
But he plainly judges evil by not willing it and condemns by forbidding, yet dismisses by not avenging and acquits by not punishing. O God, transgressor of truth, circumventor of his own sentence! He fears to condemn what he condemns; he fears to hate what he does not love; he allows the deed he does not allow to be done; he prefers to show what he does not want rather than to prove it.
This will be imaginary goodness, and the discipline itself a phantom—passing precepts, safe delinquencies. Hear, sinners—and you who are not yet such, that you may be able to be: a better god has been found, who is neither offended nor angered nor avenges, for whom no fire is kindled in Gehenna, for whom no gnashing of teeth shudders in the outer darkness: he is only good.
Finally he forbids sinning, but by letters alone. It is in you, if you wish, to seal obedience to him so that you may seem to have given God honor; for he does not want fear—and so the Marcionites openly boast that they do not fear their god at all.
‘For the bad one,’ they say, ‘will be feared, but the good one loved.’ Fool, do you deny that he whom you call Lord is to be feared, when this name is a name of power, and of power that must be feared? And how will you love unless you fear not to love?
When asked what will happen to each sinner on that day, they answer that he will be cast away. Where? If from the eyes, is this not also done by judgment? For he is judged as one to be cast away, and surely by a judgment of damnation—unless the sinner is cast away unto salvation, so that this too may suit the best god. And what will casting away be, if not losing what he would have obtained if he were not cast away, that is salvation? Therefore he will be cast away to the loss of salvation, and this cannot be decided except by one angered and offended and an executor of the offense—that is, a judge.
Latin
Sed iudicat plane malum nolendo et damnat prohibendo, dimittit autem non uindicando et absoluit non puniendo. o deum ueritatis praeuaricatorem, sententiae suae circumscriptorem! timet damnare quod damnat. timet odisse quod non amat, factum sinit quod fieri non sinit, mauult ostendere quid nolit quam probare. hoc erit bonitas imaginaria, disciplina phantasma et ipsa, transfunctoria praecepta, secura delicta. audite, peccatores, quique nondum hoc estis, ut esse possitis:\' deus melior inuentus est, qui nec offenditur nec irascitur nec ulciscitur, cui nullus ignis coquitur in gehenna, cui nullus dentium frendor horret in exterioribus tenebris: bonus tantum est. denique prohibet delinquere, sed litteris solis. in uobis est, si uelitis illi obsequium subsignare. ut honorem deo habuisse uideamini; timorem enim non uult atque adeo prae se ferunt Marcionitae, quod deum suum omnino non timeant. \'malus enim\', inquiunt, \'timebitur, bonus autem diligetur\', stulte, quem dominum appellas negas timendum, cum hoc nomen potestatis sit, etiam timendae? at quomodo diliges, nisi timeas non diligere? plane nec pater tuus est, in quem competat et amor propter pietatem et timor propter potestatem, nec legitimus dominus, ut diligas propter humanitatem et timeas propter disciplinam. sic denique plagiarii diliguntur, non etiam timentur. non enim timebitur nisi iusta et ordinaria dominatio. diligi autem potest etiam adultera; sollicitatione enim con-, stat, non auctoritate, et adulatione. non potestate. quid denique adulantius quam delicta non exequi? age itaque, qui deum non times quasi bonum, quid non in omnem libidinem ebullis, summum, quod sciam, fructum uitae omnibus, qui deum non timent? quid non frequentas tam sollemnes uoluptates circi furentis et caueae saeuientis et scaenae lasciuientis? quid non et in persecutionibus statim oblata acerra animam negatione lucraris? absit, inquis, absit! ergo iam times delictum et timendo probasti illum timeri, qui prohibet delictum. aliud est, si eadem dei tui peruersitate quae non times obseruas, qua et ille quod non uindicat prohibet. — multo adhuc uanius, cum interrogati: quid fiet peccatori cuique die illo? respondent abici illum. qua? si ab oculis, nonne et hoc iudicio agitur? iudicatur enim abiciendus, et utique iudicio damnationis; nisi si in salutem abicitur peccator, ut et hoc deo optimo competat. et quid erit abici, nisi amittere id, quod erat consecuturus. si non abiceretur, id est salutem? ergo salutis in detrimentum abicietur, et hoc decerni non poterit nisi ab irato et offenso et executore delicti, id est iudice.