III. So is the militant church one and the same, & that catholicke: that yet it fareth not e∣uer after one sort, & it may be par∣ted into diuerse particular churches.

Wee acknowledge therefore, that albeit this militant is and hath alwaies bin one, and that a catholicke church, sith it hath euer since the worlds beginning and in all places, had one and the same head, Christ, who coupleth to himselfe into one bodie, all the elect, out of all people: yet the same hath not, nor doeth euer fare or shew it selfe after the same sort: & is distinguished into manie particular chur∣ches, as into diuerse and sundrie members, according to the varietie of times, places, and people. For it was after another māner in the terrestriall paradise before sinne: and another after sinne; before the floude, and among the Patriarches: otherwise vnder the lawe, and o∣therwise vnder grace: and otherwise in Christs time among the Iewes onely, and otherwise after Christs glorification, gathered aswell of Iewes as Gentiles by the Apostles, & that not in one place, but in diuerse, neither of one people, but of diuerse and manie: neither ob∣seruing alwaies and euerie where the same ce∣rimonies: in which respects we vse to say, that there was one before, & another after Christ: and that was the church of the old Testamēt; this, of the new: & as we read, they were wont Page  185to cal them the old people, and the new: like∣wise one church was at Rome, another at Co∣rinthus, another at Ephesus, and so of the rest.