Tertullian, Prescription against Heretics 25

As I said, it is the same foolishness when they admit that the Apostles knew nothing and did not preach contradictory things among themselves, yet they refuse to accept that the Apostles revealed everything to everyone. They claim some things were entrusted openly to all, others secretly to a few, because Paul also used this language with Timothy: "Timothy, guard the deposit" (1 Timothy 6:20). And again: "Guard the good deposit" (1 Timothy 6:20). What is this deposit, kept silent, so that it might be assigned to some other doctrine? Or does it refer to that charge, about which he says: "I entrust this charge to you, my son Timothy" (1 Timothy 1:18)? Likewise, does it refer to that command, about which he says: "I charge you before God, who gives life to all things, and Christ Jesus, who testified the good confession before Pontius Pilate, to keep the commandment" (1 Timothy 6:13)? But what command, and what charge? It will be understood from the passages above and below. I am not hinting at some obscure doctrine with this statement; rather, the point is to inculcate that no teaching other than what Timothy heard from Paul—and, I think, publicly—is to be admitted. "Before many witnesses," he says. If they refuse to understand the Church as those many witnesses, it makes no difference, since nothing was kept secret that was brought forward before many witnesses. Nor does the fact that he wanted to entrust these things to faithful men who are competent to teach others serve as an argument for some hidden Gospel. For when he says "these things," he means the things he was writing about at that moment; about hidden things, as about things absent from the conscience, he would not have said "these things," but "those things."