Who was to establish this kingdom of God?  Let us remember that the first thought of Jesus, a thought so deeply rooted in him that it had probably no beginning, and formed part of his very being, was that he was the Son of God, the friend of his Father, the doer of his will.  The answer of Jesus to such a question could not therefore be doubtful.  The persuasion that he was to establish the kingdom of God took absolute possession of his mind.  He regarded himself as the universal reformer.  The heavens, the earth, the whole of nature, madness, disease, and death, were but his instruments.  In his paroxysm of heroic will, he believed himself all powerful.  If the earth would not submit to this supreme transformation, it would be broken up, purified by fire, and by the breath of God.  A new heaven would be created, and the entire world would be peopled with the angels of God.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Matt. xxii. 30.]

A radical revolution,[1] embracing even nature itself, was the fundamental idea of Jesus.  Henceforward, without doubt, he renounced politics; the example of Judas, the Gaulonite, had shown him the inutility of popular seditions.  He never thought of revolting against the Romans and tetrarchs.  His was not the unbridled and anarchical principle of the Gaulonite.  His submission to the established powers, though really derisive, was in appearance complete.  He paid tribute to Caesar, in order to avoid disturbance.  Liberty and right were not of this world, why should he trouble his life with vain anxieties?  Despising the earth, and convinced that the present world was not worth caring for, he took refuge in his ideal kingdom; he established the great doctrine of transcendent disdain,[2] the true doctrine of liberty of souls, which alone can give peace.  But he had not yet said, “My kingdom is not of this world.”  Much darkness mixed itself with even his most correct views.  Sometimes strange temptations crossed his mind.  In the desert of Judea, Satan had offered him the kingdoms of the earth.  Not knowing the power of the Roman empire, he might, with the enthusiasm there was in the heart of Judea, and which ended soon after in so terrible an outbreak, hope to establish a kingdom by the number and the daring of his partisans.  Many times, perhaps, the supreme question presented itself—­will the kingdom of God be realized by force or by gentleness, by revolt or by patience?  One day, it is said, the simple men of Galilee wished to carry him away and make him king,[3] but Jesus fled into the mountain and remained there some time alone.  His noble nature preserved him from the error which would have made him an agitator, or a chief of rebels, a Theudas or a Barkokeba.

[Footnote 1:  [Greek:  Apochatastasis panton], Acts iii. 21.]

[Footnote 2:  Matt. xvii. 23-26; xxii. 16-22.]

[Footnote 3:  John vi. 15.]