This talk of stones was harder than a stone for Simon called the Rock and for his companions. Had not John the Baptist said that God could change the stones of the Jordan into sons of Abraham? Had not Satan said that the Son of God could change the stones of the desert to loaves of wheat bread? Had not Jesus Himself said while He was passing the walls of Jerusalem that those very stones, in place of men, would have shouted out greetings and sung hymns? And was it not He who had made the stones fall from the hands of His enemies, the stones which they had taken up to kill Him? And had He not made them fall from those who accused the adulteress? But the Disciples could not understand this talk about the stones of the Temple. They could not and they would not understand that those great massive stones, quarried out patiently from the mountains, drawn from afar by oxen, squared and prepared by chisels and mallets, put one upon another by masters of the art to make the most marvelous Temple of the universe; that these stones, warm and brilliant in the sun, should be torn apart once more and pulverized into ruins. They had scarcely arrived at the Mount of Olives, and Christ had only had time to sit down opposite to the Temple, when their curiosity burst out: “Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign when all these things shall be fulfilled?” The answer was the discourse on the Last Things, the second Sermon on the Mount. At the beginning of His work, He had explained how the soul must be transformed to found the Kingdom; now at death’s door He taught what the punishment of the stubborn would be and in what manner He would come again. This discourse, less understood than the other, and even more forgotten, is not, as it is generally believed, the answer to one question only. The Disciples had put two questions, “When shall these things be?” That is, the ruin of the Temple; and “What shall be the signs of Thy coming?” There are two answers to these two questions. Jesus first describes the events which will precede the destruction of Jerusalem, and then He describes the signs of His second appearance. The prophetic discourse, although it is read all in one piece in the Gospels, had two parts. The prophecies are two, quite distinct from each other; the first was fulfilled before the end of Jesus’ generation, about forty years after His death. The second has not yet been fulfilled, but perhaps before the passing of our own generation the first signs will be seen. SHEEP AND GOATS Jesus knew the weakness of the Disciples, weakness of the spirit, and perhaps also of the flesh, and He puts them on their guard against two great perils: fraud and martyrdom.