49. I.e., and what is worse, they practice their idolatry secretly.
TRACTATE 6 145 outside. Hold fast therefore what you have received; change the fact that you have received outside. You have received what belongs to the dove outside the dove. There are two things which you are hearing: you have received, and you have received outside the dove. What you have received, I approve; that you received outside, I disapprove. Hold fast, therefore, what you have received; it is not changed, but acknowledged. It is the mark of my king. I shall not be sacrilegious. I chastise the deserter; I do not change the mark. 17. Do not boast about your baptism because I say it actually is [baptism]. Look, I say, it actually is. The whole Catholic church says it actually is. The dove perceives and acknowledges and moans because you have it outside. She sees there what she acknowledges; she sees also what she should correct.
It actually is [baptism]. Come. Do you boast because it actually is, and not wish to come? Well then, what about evil men who do not belong to the dove? The dove speaks to you: There are evil men, among whom I moan, who do not belong to my members and it is necessary that I moan among them; do they not also have what you boast that you have? And do not many drunkards have baptism? And many greedy men? And many idolaters, and what is worse, secretly? Do not pagans go, or at least used to go, to the idols publicly?
(2) Now Christians seek out fortune-tellers and consult astrologers secretly. And these have baptism, but the dove moans among the ravens. Why then do you rejoice because you have? You have what even an evil man has. Have humihty, love, peace; have the good which you do not yet have so that the good which you do have may benefit you.
18. For what you have Simon Magus also had."^** The Acts of the Apostles are witness, that canonical book which must be read each year in the Church. You know that annually during the holy season after the Passion of the Lord, that Scripture is read where it was written how the Apostle was converted and became a preacher from [having been] a persecutor,*^* and
49. I.e., and what is worse, they practice their idolatry secretly. 50. Cf. Acts 8.9-23. 51. Cf. Acts 9.1-30.