The Second Apology

And I despised the wicked and deceitful doctrine of Simon from my own people. If you give authority to this book, we will expose him to everyone, so that, if possible, they may be converted. This is the sole reason we wrote this treatise. Our doctrines are not shameful, according to a sober judgment, but indeed more lofty than all human philosophy. And if not, they are at least unlike the doctrines of the Sotadists, Philænidians, Dancers, Epicureans, and other such teachings of the poets, which everyone is allowed to become familiar with both as performed and as written. From now on, we shall be silent, having done as much as we could and adding the prayer that all people everywhere may be deemed worthy of the truth. And would that you also, in a manner fitting for piety and philosophy, judge justly for your own sakes!