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.