upon earth the ideal which he had conceived.  “To await the kingdom of God” is henceforth synonymous with being a disciple of Jesus.[2] This phrase, “kingdom of God,” or “kingdom of heaven,” was, as we have said, already long familiar to the Jews.  But Jesus gave it a moral sense, a social application, which even the author of the Book of Daniel, in his apocalyptic enthusiasm, had scarcely dared to imagine.

[Footnote 1:  Mark i. 14, 15.]

[Footnote 2:  Mark xv. 43.]

He declared that in the present world evil is the reigning power.  Satan is “the prince of this world,"[1] and everything obeys him.  The kings kill the prophets.  The priests and the doctors do not that which they command others to do; the righteous are persecuted, and the only portion of the good is weeping.  The “world” is in this manner the enemy of God and His saints:[2] but God will awaken and avenge His saints.  The day is at hand, for the abomination is at its height.  The reign of goodness will have its turn.

[Footnote 1:  John xii. 31, xiv. 30, xvi. 11. (Comp. 2 Cor. iv. 4; Ephes. ii. 2.)]

[Footnote 2:  John i. 10, vii. 7, xiv. 17, 22, 27, xv. 18, and following; xvi. 8, 20, 33, xvii. 9, 14, 16, 25.  This meaning of the word “world” is especially applied in the writings of Paul and John.]

The advent of this reign of goodness will be a great and sudden revolution.  The world will seem to be turned upside down; the actual state being bad, in order to represent the future, it suffices to conceive nearly the reverse of that which exists.  The first shall be last.[1] A new order shall govern humanity.  Now the good and the bad are mixed, like the tares and the good grain in a field.  The master lets them grow together; but the hour of violent separation will arrive.[2] The kingdom of God will be as the casting of a great net, which gathers both good and bad fish; the good are preserved, and the rest are thrown away.[3] The germ of this great revolution will not be recognizable in its beginning.  It will be like a grain of mustard-seed, which is the smallest of seeds, but which, thrown into the earth, becomes a tree under the foliage of which the birds repose;[4] or it will be like the leaven which, deposited in the meal, makes the whole to ferment.[5] A series of parables, often obscure, was designed to express the suddenness of this event, its apparent injustice, and its inevitable and final character.[6]

[Footnote 1:  Matt. xix. 30, xx. 16; Mark x. 31; Luke xiii. 30.]

[Footnote 2:  Matt. xiii. 24, and following.]

[Footnote 3:  Matt. xiii. 47, and following.]

[Footnote 4:  Matt. xiii. 31, and following; Mark iv. 31, and following; Luke xiii. 19, and following.]

[Footnote 5:  Matt. xiii. 33; Luke xiii. 21.]

[Footnote 6:  Matt. xiii. entirely; xviii. 23, and following; xx. 1, and following; Luke xiii. 18, and following.]