Tertullian

“ For the people, after crossing the sea, and being carried about in the desert during forty years, although they were there nourished with divine supplies, nevertheless were more mindful of their belly and their gullet than of God. Thereupon the Lord, driven apart into desert places after baptism, [9] showed, by maintaining a fast of forty days, that the man of God lives “not by bread alone,” but “by the word of God;” ”

“ Chapter XX.—Of Preparation For, and Conduct After, the Reception of Baptism.
They who are about to enter baptism ought to pray with repeated prayers, fasts, and bendings of the knee, and vigils all the night through, and with the confession of all by- gone sins, that they may express the meaning even of the baptism of John: “They were baptized,” saith (the Scripture) , “confessing their own sins.” ”

“ Well, you have asked, and have received; you have knocked, and it has been opened to you. Only, I pray that, when you are asking, you be mindful likewise of Tertullian the sinner. [16]
Footnotes ↑ Matt. iii. 6. [See the collection of Dr. Bunsen for the whole primitive discipline to which Tertullian has reference, Hippol. Vol. III. pp. 5–23, and 29.] ↑ Perhaps Tertullian is referring to Prov. xxviii. 13. If we confess now, we shall be forgiven, and not put to shame at the judgment day.↑ See de Orat. c. xxiii. ”