Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: George Townshend, The Mission of Baha'u'llah: And Other Literary Pieces, bahai-library.com.
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THE MISSION OF
BAHÁ’U’LLÁH
and other literary pieces

by
GEORGE TOWNSHEND

GEORGE RONALD
Oxford
Copyright by George Townshend 1952

Printed in England by
Samuel Sidders & Son Ltd., 115, Salusbury Road, London, N.W.6.
Preface
THOUGH THE LITERARY pieces that make up this volume are varied in type,
they have their definite balance and unity. They are intended to expand the
personal and devotional aspect of the Bahá’í Faith not less than the historical.
The Genius of Ireland is the name-essay of a book now out of print. The
essay entitled The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh has appeared as the Introduction to
God Passes By by Shoghi Effendi (1944). ‘Nabíl’s History of the Báb’ was
published in the American magazine World Order: ‘Queen Marie and the
Bahá’í Faith’ and ‘The Wellspring of Happiness’ in the biennial The Bahá’í
World. Permission to reprint is gratefully acknowledged. The poems and
devotional pieces appeared (with one or two exceptions) in The Altar on the
Hearth (1926). They are printed here as being in fact a response to the first
stirrings of that new spiritual life which Bahá’u’lláh breathes in those who turn to
Him, and are in a small way a true record of the devotional approach made by a
Christian home to the realisation of the Day of God and the acknowledgement of
Bahá’u’lláh as its Lord.
The poem addressed to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, which follows immediately, was
accepted by Him in 1920.
George Townshend
*
Ripley,
Dundrum,
Co. Dublin,
Eire.

Bahá’í Publishing Trust, Wilmette, Illinois. 1974.
World Order Magazine, New York.
Bahá’í World, vol. VIII, 1936–1938 (Bahá’í Publishing Trust, Wilmette, Illinois), pp. 769, 771–
5.
*
‘Ripley’ is/was most likely near the start of Mount Anville Road, Dundrum.
To
‘Abdu’l-Bahá
HAIL to Thee, Scion of Glory, Whose utterance poureth abroad
The joy of the heavenly knowledge and the light of the greatest
of days!
Poet of mysteries chanting in rapture the beauty of God,
Unto Thee be thanksgiving’ and praise!
Child of the darkness that wandered in gloom but dreamed of
the light,
Lo! I have seen Thy splendour ablaze in the heavens afar
Showering gladness and glory and shattering the shadows of
night,
And seen no other star.
Thy words are to me as fragrances borne from the garden of
heaven,
Beams of a lamp that is hid in the height of a holier world,
Arrows of fire that pierce and destroy with the might of the Levin
Into our midnight hurled.
Sword of the Father! none other can rend the dark veil from
my eyes,
None other can beat from my limbs with the shearing blade of
God’s might
The sins I am fettered withal and give me the power to rise
And come forth to the fullness of light.

Lo! Thou hast breathed on my sorrow the sweetness of faith and
of hope,
Thou hast chanted high paeans of joy that my heart’s echoes ever
repeat
And the path to the knowledge of God begins to glimmer and ope
Before my faltering feet.
Weak and unworthy my praise. Yet, as from its throbbing throat
Some lone bird pours its song to the flaming infinite sky,
So unto Thee in the zenith I lift from a depth remote
This broken human cry.
Contents
Preface.. ................................................................................................... . 3
To ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.. ................................................................................... . 4
Part I
The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh.. .................................................................. . 9
Nabíl’s history of the Báb.. ..................................................................... . 19
‘Abdu’l-Bahá: A study of a Christlike character.. ................................. . 46
Queen Marie of Rumania and the Bahá’í Faith.. .................................... . 56
The call to God: A meditation.. .............................................................. . 66
The letters of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.. .................................................................. . 77
The wellspring of happiness.. ................................................................. . 88
The genius of Ireland.. ............................................................................ . 104
Part II
To Bahá’u’lláh.. ...................................................................................... . 121
Contents 7
. 122

Part III
Meditations, devotions and poems
For a seeker.. ........................................................................................... . 122
To assailing doubts.. ............................................................................... . 129
A vision of God’s triumph.. .................................................................... . 131
A vision of the day of judgment.. ........................................................... . 132
For Ireland.. ............................................................................................. . 134
For mother and father.............................................................................. . 135
A little child shall lead them.. ................................................................. . 150
Envoy.. .................................................................................................... . 153
Part I
The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
HERE is a history of our times written on an unfamiliar theme—a history
filled with love and happiness and vision and strength, telling of triumphs gained
and wider triumphs yet to come: and whatever it holds of darkest tragedy it
leaves mankind at its close not facing a grim inhospitable future but marching out
from the shadows on the high road of an inevitable destiny towards the opened
gates of the Promised City of Eternal Peace.
These hundred years as we have known them have been distinguished by
human achievements and marvels unparalleled in any annals, and also by
unparalleled disillusion and loss. But this history tells of wonders greater,
mightier, more beneficent, wrought in the same period: and its tidings instead of
tears and sorrow are of long forgotten Joy and vanished Power descended from
heaven once more into the world of action and the lives of mortal men. It tells of
things divine: of the birth of a new World Faith in our midst—a Faith which
comes in succession to all the World Faiths of the past, acknowledging all,
fulfilling all, carrying the common purpose of all to its consummation: and
bearing to the Christians, “the People of the Gospel”, a special summons to rise
and help speed its propagation through the whole earth.
The narrative centres round one majestic lonely Figure, and its animating
motive is the infinite transcendent love He bears for all mankind and the
answering love which He draws forth from the hearts of the faithful.
The theme on its human side is that of Love and Struggle and Death. It tells
of men and women like ourselves, adventuring all they had and all they were for
sheer love’s sake, of desolated homes, of breaking hearts, of bereavement and
exile and suffering and indomitable purpose.

Originally published as the Introduction to Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By. Bahá’í Publishing
Trust, Wilmette, Illinois. 1944.
10 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
For long it seemed as if the world were too unhappy, too content with trivial
pursuits to be able to accept in practice a Revelation so spiritual, so universal.
Time and again the violent extirpation of the Faith at the hands of tyranny
seemed assured. Many there were in high places in diverse lands who knew of
the Faith, who were informed of the cruel wrongs inflicted on its votaries and
heard their protests and appeals for justice. But there was none who heeded or
who helped.
Strange and pitiful that an eager, inquiring Age which discovered so much of
truth should have left the spiritual realm unexplored and should have missed the
most important truth of all.
No Prophet has ever come into the world with greater proofs of His identity
than Bahá’u’lláh: nor in the first century of its activity has any older Faith
achieved so much or spread so far across the globe as this.
The mightiest proof of a Prophet has ever been found in Himself and in the
efficacy of His word. Bahá’u’lláh rekindled the fires of faith and of happiness in
the hearts of men. His knowledge was innate and spontaneous, not acquired in
any school. None could gainsay or resist His wisdom and even His worst
enemies admitted His greatness. All human perfections were embodied in Him.
His strength was infinite. Trials and sufferings increased His firmness and
power. As a divine physician He diagnosed the malady of the Age and
prescribed the remedy. His teachings were universal and conferred illumination
on all mankind. His power has been poured forth more abundantly since His
death. In His prescience He stood alone and events have proved and are still
proving its accuracy.
A second proof which every Prophet has brought with him has been the
witness of the past: the evidence of Ancient Prophecy.
The fulfilment in this Day of the prophecies contained in the Qur’án and in
Muslim tradition has not prevented Islám from persecuting the Bahá’í Faith but it
has been startling and notorious.
The fulfilment of the prophecies of Christ and of the Bible has been over a
period of a hundred years or more matter of common
The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh 11
knowledge and remark in the West. But the full extent of that fulfilment is only
seen in Bahá’u’lláh. The proclamation of His Faith was made in 1844, the year
when the strict exclusion of the Jews from their own land enforced by the
Muslims for some twelve centuries was at last relaxed by the Edict of Toleration
and “the times of the Gentiles” were “fulfilled”. The Advent has been long
delayed and has fallen in a time of oppression and iniquity, of religious unreality
and disbelief, when love for God and man had grown cold, when men were
3 4
immersed in material business and pleasure. The Prophet came like a thief in
the night and was here in our midst while people were wrapped in deep spiritual
slumber. He tried and tested souls, separated the spiritual from the unspiritual,
true from false believers, the sheep from the goats; and the people taken
unawares were caught as in a snare and knew not their danger till the retributive
justice of God closed in upon them. Yet the appearance of the Faith and the
rapidity and direction of its extension was as the lightning which flashes from the
East to the West. Christianity in contrast to the Revelation of Muḥammad had
spread from the East to the West and has been predominantly a Western Faith.
The Bahá’í Faith likewise has moved westward but with even greater speed and
momentum than Christianity.

From the beginning of the Era, from the days of the Herald of the Faith, the
Báb, the chronicles show a conscious sympathy of Christians with the New
Teaching, which was in marked contrast with the attitude of their Muslim
neighbours. The earliest instance of this, perhaps, is the kindly tribute of Dr.
Cormick, an English physician resident in Ṭihrán, to the Báb whom he attended
in prison when suffering from the effects of torture, and his record of the
prevalent opinion that the teaching of the Báb resembled Christianity. The first
Western historian of the Movement, Count Gobineau, a French diplomat, wrote
(1865) with enthusiasm of the Báb’s saintliness, of the loftiness of His ideals, of
His charm, His eloquence, and of the astonishing power of His words over both
friend and foe: Ernest Renan in Les Apôtres 1866), Lord Curzon in Persia,
Professor Browne of Cambridge

Luke 21:4.
Matthew 12:48.
Matthew 24:38.
Matthew 24:43.
Luke 21:35.
Matthew 24:27.
12 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
in several works, and many Christian men of letters of later date have written in a
similar strain.
But among the many instances of this instinctive sympathy, the most
spectacular is that which marked the execution of the Báb in the market square of
Tabríz on July 9th, 1850. The officer in charge of the firing party was a
Christian. He approached the Báb and prayed Him that on this account and
because he had no enmity towards Him in his heart he might be spared the guilt
of perpetrating so heinous a crime. The Báb replied that if his prayer were
sincere God was able to fulfil his desire. The remarkable miracle by which this
prayer was granted, and the martyrdom of the Báb carried out by another
regiment under a Muslim officer, is a part of history.
The Christian West, though far from the scene of the Prophet’s ministry, felt
and responded practically to the divine World Impulse decades before the East.
Poets, major and minor, Shelley and Wordsworth and many another, sang of a
new Dawn. A new missionary effort spread the Christian Gospel through the
earth: spiritual men and women sought to revive reality in religion: reformers
arose to redress long-standing evils; novelists used their art for a social purpose.
How different all this from the action of the corrupt, fanatical, persecuting East!
The Báb Himself identified His teaching in spirit and purpose with that of
Christ which was a preparation for His own: and He quoted some of Christ’s
instructions to His disciples as part of His own ordination address to the “Letters
of the Living”.
Bahá’u’lláh from the beginning seems to have realised the special capacity of
the progressive and enterprising West. He took the most vigorous steps possible
to bring the Truth of the Age to the knowledge of the West and its leaders.
Debarred from delivering His message to Europe in person, He wrote from a
Turkish prison a general Tablet to the Christians, and another Tablet to the
Sovereigns and leading men of the world but especially to the rulers of
Christendom: and He also addressed five personal Tablets, one to the Czar,
another to the Pope, another to Queen Victoria and two to Napoleon III. In these,
in ringing tones of power and majesty such as would become the
The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh 13
King of Kings imposing commands upon His vassals, He declared this Age the
Supreme Day of God and Himself the Lord of Lords, the Father who had come in
His most great glory. All that had been mentioned in the Gospel had been
fulfilled. Jesus had announced this Light and His signs had been spread in the
West, that His followers might in this Day set their faces towards Bahá’u’lláh.
These letters are indeed pronouncements of a far-sighted Providence: and the
catastrophe of the West which has occurred since they were written gives to them
now a tragic and a terrible interest. They are of some length but their drift may
be generally indicated in a few paragraphs.
In His Tablet to Queen Victoria He commends Her Majesty for ending the
slave trade and for “entrusting the reins of counsel into the hands of the
representatives of the people.” But they who entered the Assembly should do so
in a spirit of prayer to God and of trusteeship for the best interests of all mankind.
The human race was one whole and should be regarded as the human body which
though created perfect had become afflicted with grave disorders. It lay at the
mercy of rulers so drunk with pride that they could not see their own best
advantage, much less recognise this mighty Revelation. The one real remedy for
the world’s ills was the union of all its peoples in one universal Cause, one
common Faith. This could be brought to pass only through the Divine Physician.
He called on the Queen to ensure peace, to be just and considerate to her subjects,
to avoid excessive taxation, to effect an international union for the reduction of
armaments and the joint resistance of all nations to any aggressor Power.
His Tablet to the Pope contains an impassioned, loving appeal to Christians
that they will recognise this, the Promised Day of God, that they will come forth
into its light and acclaim their Lord, and enter the Kingdom in His name. They
were created for the light and He likes not to see them in the darkness. Christ
purified the world with Love and with the Spirit that in this Day it might be able
to receive Life at the hands of the Merciful. This is the coming of the Father of
whom Isaiah spoke: the teaching
14 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
which He now reveals is that which Christ withheld when He said, “other things I
have to say unto you but ye cannot bear them now.” He bids the Pontiff take the
Cup of Life and drink therefrom and “offer it then to such as turn towards it
amongst the peoples of all Faiths.”
The Tablet to Alexander II is in answer to a prayer addressed by the Czar to
His Lord and in recognition of a kindness shown to Bahá’u’lláh when in prison
and in chains by an ambassador of the Czar. He impresses on the Czar the
supreme greatness of this Manifestation, tells him how the Prophet has subjected
Himself to a thousand calamities for the salvation of the world and, having
brought life to men, is threatened by them with death. He bids him expose this
injustice, and in love for God and God’s kingdom offer himself as a ransom in
God’s path: no harm will come to him but a reward in this world and the next.
Great, great the blessing in store for the king who gives his heart to his Lord.
In His two Tablets to Napoleon III, Bahá’u’lláh impresses on the Emperor the
oneness of mankind whose many maladies will not be cured unless the nations,
abandoning the pursuit of their several interests, agree together and unite in
common obedience to the plan of God. The human race should be as one body
and one soul. A far higher degree of faith than the world has ever reached before
is demanded by God of every man in this Era. All are commanded to teach the
truth and to work for God’s cause: but no one will produce good results in this
service unless he first purify and ennoble his own character.
Bahá’u’lláh bids the clergy give up their seclusion, mingle in the life of the
people and marry. God is calling men to Him in this Age, and any theology
which takes its own theses as a standard of truth and turns away from Him is
deprived of value and efficacy.
He has come to regenerate and unite all mankind in very deed and truth and
He will gather them at the one table of His bounty. Let the Emperor call on His
name and declare His truth to the people.
Grave warnings and open or implicit threats if the kings do not acknowledge
the Manifestation and obey His commands are contained in all these Tablets,
especially in this to Napoleon III. The
The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh 15
collective Tablet addressed to all the kings is, however, stern and minatory
beyond the rest. Bahá’u’lláh warns the rulers that if they do not treat the poor
amongst them as a trust from God; if they do not observe the strictest justice; if
they do not compose their differences, heal the dissensions that estrange them
and reduce their armaments, and follow the other counsels now given them by the
Prophet, “Divine chastisement shall assail you from every direction and the
sentence of His justice shall be pronounced against you. On that day ye shall
have no power to resist Him and shall recognise your own impotence. Have
mercy on yourselves and on those beneath you.”
Christ long centuries before had wept over the city whose children had
ignored His visitation and refused His protection. Now at His second coming the
same event recurred. But they who brought down the wrath of God on
themselves were not the members of a nation but of an entire world.
Before He passed away Bahá’u’lláh proclaimed: “The hour is approaching
when the most great convulsion will have appeared.” And again, “The time for
the destruction of the world and its people hath arrived.”
More than forty years after the dispatch of these Tablets ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, the
son of the Prophet and the appointed Exemplar of His Faith, being freed at last
from prison by the Young Turks, made a three years’ tour of Europe and
America. Saddened by many things He saw, and knowing the doom to which the
heedlessness of the nations was hurrying them, He was sparing of denunciation,
reproach or criticism; instead, with words of cheer and undiscriminating love He
summoned His hearers to high, heroic action. He spoke much of the spiritual and
social goal set by God for this enlightened Age: “The Most Great Peace.” He
Himself in His joy, in His serenity, in His love for all, in His wisdom, His
strength and resolution and utter submissiveness to God, seemed the incarnation
of the Spirit of that Peace. His very presence brought receptive souls into touch
with a state of being of which they might have heard but which none of them had
ever known. Through many months of missionary work He explained the moral
and spiritual conditions which would make possible the
16 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
Most Great Peace, and developed in many addresses the practical means by
which it could be approached. In the United States, at Wilmette on the shores of
Lake Michigan, He laid the foundation stone of the first Bahá’í Temple of the
West, round which are to be grouped buildings devoted to social, humanitarian,
educational and scientific purposes, the whole to be dedicated as one scheme to
the glory of God and the service of man. He also saw in America the first
beginnings of the building of the Administrative Order of Bahá’u’lláh.
But the general response of the public was not sufficient to stem the tides
flowing towards war. Before He left the United States, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá foretold the
outbreak of hostilities in two years’ time.
When at last peace was made, He declared that the League of Nations as
constituted could not prevent war; and before He passed away in 1921 He
announced to His followers the outbreak of another war fiercer than the last.
To many, at the opening of the second Bahá’í century, mankind seems to be
drifting in a helmless barque upon a stormy and uncharted sea. But to the
Bahá’ís another vision is revealed. The barriers by which men blocked their path
to progress are torn down. Human pride is abased, human wisdom stultified.
The anarchy of nationalism and the insufficiency of secularism are thoroughly
exposed.
Slowly the veil lifts from the future. Along whatever road thoughtful men
look out they see before them some guiding truth, some leading principle, which
Bahá’u’lláh gave long ago and which men rejected. The sum and essence of the
best hopes of the best minds to-day is garnered in such a simple statement as that
of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s “Twelve Points”:
1. Unfettered search after truth.
2. The oneness of mankind.
3. Religion a cause of love and harmony.
4. Religion hand in hand with science.
5. Universal peace.
6. An international language.
7. Education for all.
8. Equal opportunities for both sexes.
The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh 17
9. Justice for all.
10. Work for all.
11. Abolition of extremes of poverty and wealth.
12. The Holy Spirit to be the prime motive power in life.
The immense, complex, baffling task of unifying all peoples is set forth in its
complete and inmost simplicity by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in seven pregnant phrases:
1. Unity in the political realm.
2. Unity of thought in world undertakings.
3. Unity of freedom.
4. Unity in religion.
5. Unity of nations.
6. Unity of races.
7. Unity of language.
Already the Bahá’ís have begun in deed and in fact to build the instrument
destined to be the model and the nucleus of the Most Great Peace. The
Administrative Order is as simple as it is profoundly conceived, and it can only
be conducted by those whose lives are animated by love and fear of God. It is a
system in which such opposites as unity and universality, the practical and the
spiritual, the rights of the individual and the rights of society, are perfectly
balanced not through arranging a compromise but through the revelation of an
inner harmony. Those who have the experience of operating the Order testify
that it seems to them like a human body which is made to express the soul within.
On the lake shore at Wilmette stands the completed Temple of Praise, a sign
of the Spirit of the Most Great Peace and of the Splendour of God that has come
down to dwell among men. The walls of the Temple are transparent, made of an
open tracery cut as in sculptured stone, and lined with glass. All imaginable
symbols of light are woven together into the pattern, the lights of the sun and the
moon and the constellations, the lights of the spiritual heavens unfolded by the
great Revealers of to-day and yesterday, the Cross in various forms, the Crescent
and the nine pointed Star (emblem of the Bahá’í Faith). No darkness invades the
Temple at any time; by day it is lighted by the sun whose rays flood in from
every side through the exquisitely perforated walls,
18 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
and by night it is artificially illuminated and its ornamented shape is etched with
light against the dark. From whatever side the visitor approaches, the aspiring
form of the Temple appears as the spirit of adoration; and seen from the air above
it has the likeness of a Nine-Pointed Star come down from heaven to find its
resting place on the earth.
But for the leading of the peoples into the Promised Land, for the
spiritualising of mankind, for the attainment of the Most Great Peace the world
awaits the arising of those whom the King of Kings has summoned to the task—
the Christians and the Churches of the West.
Verily Christ said ‘Come that I may make you fishers of men’ and to-day We say
‘Come, that We may make you quickeners of the world’ … Lo! This is the Day of
Grace! Come ye that I may make you kings of the realm of My Kingdom. If ye
obey Me you will see that which We have promised you, and I will make you the
friends of My Soul in the realm of My Greatness and the Companions of My
Beauty in the heaven of My Might for ever.
Nabíl’s history of the Báb
HERE ONCE AGAIN in human history is the Light shining in a darkness that
comprehendeth it not! Here once again is Faith re-arisen upon the world,
bringing a New Day, shedding a new glory, calling men from sleep to a new life.
Here once again is Religion that men had thought sunk for ever in
impotence—religion in its freshness, its purity and its power, religion reborn with
all the magic of that ancient sweetness and beauty with which it was clothed in
Holy Writ of old—religion warming men’s hearts with a new compassion and
loving-kindness, melting all estrangements, uniting many wills in a common
devotion, a common sympathy, giving to life a new completeness, transcending
sorrow and pain and death!
We of the western world may be unable to trace in human affairs about us the
providence of God, may not see His path opening before our feet, may not be
aware of His activity and presence in our midst, we may be divided one against
another, may be full of fears, devoid of love, laden with deepening doubt.
But here are men and women, boys and girls who through faith reborn
became possessed of a knowledge to which we are strangers, entered into an
experience which we hardly believe to exist, whose eyes were opened to the
Light from heaven, who had ears to hear the voice of God, and being changed
from their old selves, transformed into new creatures, translated to a new degree
of life, were by divine grace endowed with a courage, an energy, a blissfulness
which has no likeness on the earth and which no earthly privation can impair.
They had none of these things through which we of the West give expression
to our religion: they had no systems of theology and ethics, no traditions,
dogmas, creeds, institutions. Love and obedience and joy (love for God and His
prophet, the joy of obeying the divine summons, even to the extent of sacrificing
for

20 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
love’s sake all they had and all they were)—these and these only were the marks
of their religion.
All we have heard or read of the birth of a World Religion among men—of
the Advent of a Divine Teacher, of the simple beginnings of His work, of the
charm of His personality, of the love that He awakens in His followers, of His
courage and authority, and His ability to overcome the whole world by the lonely
power of His word—all this is here again; and the facts and the details and the
circumstances of His coming are transcribed into the pages of this chronicle. He
calls on men to leave the idols and the torpors of the past, to awake and to greet
the Dayspring from on High; to join the legions of light and partake with him in
the approaching world-triumph of God. Thousands upon thousands flocked to
His banner, young and old, high and low, learned and unlearned, men and
women, boys and girls. Thrilled with a new-born faith, animated with a magical
love they acclaimed His prophethood and without reserve offered themselves as
criers of the New Advent, torch-bearers of the New Revelation. When the envy
of the mosque and the court stirred up far and wide against them the latent fire of
Muslim fanaticism, they found in the strain that was put upon them a means of
showing forth before men what power of soul God gives in their extremity to
those who love Him utterly before all else.
With eager courage they challenged every form of persecution—ostracism,
impoverishment, privation, beating, torture. Transported with a divine hope,
sustained by an unshakeable resolution they counted suffering for God’s sake a
supreme blessing, and measured the greatness of their spiritual privilege by the
anguish of their bodily pain. They welcomed martyrdom and endured its
cruellest pangs with a serenity that moved their executioners to wonder and that
bore immortal witness to the truth of the Faith for which they died. They knew
no fear, no doubt; weariness could not relax their resolution, nor cloud their
confidence.
Throughout the entire length of the action of this narrative, in the darkest hour
of tragedy and of defeat, there sounds the call of assured victory, of triumph and
of celestial joy. No human circumstance, however desperate, can chill or depress
the ardour
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 21
of the faithful. No physical privation, no hunger, no pain, no bereavement, no
sorrow nor the violent hand of death can blot from their vision the sweetness of
the Beloved’s face or weaken the heart-beats of their impassioned adoration.
Here is no disquisition on the nature of Faith, no analysis of its elements.
Here rather is Faith itself, Faith put to the proof, Faith in action, Faith naked,
unarmed, alone, standing at bay against a thousand foes and remaining ever
serene, unwavering, indomitable. Here is trust in God which impels not only the
old but the young, to cast away their pleasures, their hopes, their careers, the joys
of friendships and of home since thereby they can the better serve the will of Him
Whom they love better than all mortal things. Eager, earnest, ardent, they find in
the sacrifice they offer to their Beloved a sweeter, dearer happiness than
otherwise is within the reach of created man.
Here once more is the Messenger of God, God’s image mirrored in an allperfect Love, God’s power poured forth among men stirring them to a new
spirituality, opening to them new reaches of consciousness. Here in very deed
and in a form and fashion that none can gainsay or disown, is the vindication of
the reality of religion, the proof of its present power in this modem world. Here
is the re-affirmation of the dignity of human nature and of the infinite greatness
of the purpose of human life.
Not in the dream of a saint, nor the vision of a seer nor the imagination of a
poet is this given, but in the prose of a chronicler who sets forth in detail the
course of actual historical events in a contemporary record that bears its own
mark of truthfulness and is corroborated by extraneous evidence from a hundred
sources.
The author, known to history as Nabíl, was himself a believer, a Persian, a
follower of the Báb and afterwards of Him for Whose advent the Báb made ready
the way. From the summer of 1849, at the time of the siege of Fort Ṭabarsí, he
shared as an avowed believer in the dangers and adventures of his companions,
and escaping with his life, he accumulated memories and made friendships which
were to serve him well later in the compilation of material for this work. In the
course of his narrative, he tells

The Dawn-Breakers: Nabíl’s Narrative of the Early Days of the Bahá’í Revelation, tr. Shoghi
Effendi. Bahá’í Publishing Trust, Wilmette, Illinois. 1932.
22 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
how as a boy, while he tended his master’s sheep upon the Persian hills, he would
dream of a religion more real than that in which he had been brought up and of a
spirituality more pure than that of the ecclesiastics who were his appointed
teachers.
When in the summer of 1847, at the age of fifteen, he heard of the Revelation
of the Báb, he felt intuitively, at once, that here his dreams had come true and he
had of a surety found the religion for which in the lonely thoughts of his heart he
had so eagerly longed.
He made inquiries, he pursued his investigations, he pondered over what he
learned, he felt that contagion of felicity which marked the Bábís; and after two
years, convinced of the truth of the Báb’s Prophethood, he openly espoused the
Faith and spent the rest of his life in the hazards and vicissitudes of its service.
He was possessed of a vigorous and ready pen; and his ardour and constancy
as a believer brought him the best of opportunities for composing such a recital of
the deeds of the Bábí pioneers as this. No detached observer or scholar, however
inquisitive or industrious, could be in so favourable a position as this trusted Bábí
for collecting detailed and intimate information concerning the early believers
and their doings. He stood close to the heart and centre of the Movement; he
presented it with sympathy and understanding, and he gave his work a vividly
dramatic quality by reflecting so clearly the spiritual experience of his heroes and
by reproducing with power their feelings, their motives and their aspirations. He
shared their enthusiasm and their high purpose in full measure; and his narration
is sustained throughout by that profound impassioned love which gave to the
crusade in those days its rushing irresistible force.
How wonderful the intuition that could reveal to him a truth utterly hidden
from the learning and the culture of the great world in his day! How wonderful
the steadfastness that could preserve him in his faith through a thousand
adversities and sustain him through the long toils of preparing this invaluable
compilation. He has his reward. This love-inspired tribute to the heroes he
honoured before all on earth stands an immortal monument to his own illustrious
memory, and in after ages will draw to him an
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 23
unfailing stream of grateful thoughts from the believers of many generations.
The volume of Nabíl’s work now published in an English rendering recites
the activities of the Báb during His ministry and pursues the fortunes of his
followers for two years after His martyrdom. It covers a period of some eight
years, and closes with the final expulsion of the Faith from the land of its origin.
The narrative is intensely human, vivid, realistic. It presents a panorama of the
entire movement in a series of pictures, incidents, episodes, some sketched in
brief, some expanded in much detail, but all set forth in a style clear, graphic,
powerful, glowing with the radiant fire of the author’s unfailing enthusiasm.
The date chosen by the Báb for making known His status as a World Prophet
and for inaugurating His Ministry was May 23rd, 1844. The declaration was
made in His house in Shíráz to Mullá Ḥusayn, who became the first of His
Apostles, or His “Letters of the Living Word”, with the particular designation of
the “Bábu’l-Báb”, or the Gate of the Gate.
The full account which Mullá Ḥusayn gave of this momentous interview to
Mírzá Aḥmad-i-Qazvíní, the martyr, has been preserved by Nabíl, and it contains
the following description of the immediate impression made by the Báb upon the
first believer:
This Revelation so suddenly and impetuously thrust upon me came as a
thunderbolt which for a time seemed to have benumbed my faculties. I was
blinded by its dazzling splendour and overwhelmed by its crushing force.
Excitement, joy, awe and wonder stirred the depths of my soul. Predominant
among these emotions was a sense of gladness and strength which seemed to have
transfigured me. How feeble and impotent, how dejected and timid I had felt
previously! Then I could neither write nor walk, so tremulous were my hands and
feet. Now, however, the knowledge of His Revelation had galvanised my being. I
felt possessed of such courage and power that were the world, all its people and its
potentates to rise against me, I would alone and undaunted withstand their
24 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
onslaught. The universe seemed but a handful of dust in my grasp. I seemed to be
the voice of Gabriel personified, railing unto all mankind:
‘Awake, for lo! the morning Light has broken. Arise, for His Cause is made
manifest. The portal of His grace is open wide; enter therein, O ye people of the
world! For He, who is your promised One, is come!’
The call of Mullá Ḥusayn was the opening of the Báb’s campaign.
As mysteriously Mullá Ḥusayn had been drawn into the presence of the Báb,
so the other disciples came to Him, spontaneously and of their own accord,
within a few days of His Declaration. After brief instruction, He sent them out
far and wide to bear His Message to various parts of the land. Each was to send
back to Him the names of all the converts who definitely identified themselves
with the New Faith: these the Báb would classify and record.
To Ḥusayn He gave a special mission; and as soon as He was assured of its
success, He set forth on October 10th, 1844, with Quddús, the greatest of all the
believers, on the distant and difficult mission He had reserved for Himself. He
struck at the strategic centre of the Muhammadan Faith, and went on the
pilgrimage to Mecca and to Medina, to reveal the Cause of God in those sacred
spots and to rekindle there, in the spiritual heart of Islám, the Ancient Fire which
had so completely disappeared from among men.
He chose, as the recipients of His Message, two individuals whom He knew
to be spiritually capable of appreciating it: Mírzá Muḥíṭ-i-Kirmání and the Sherif
*
of Mecca. Both were men of distinction and influence. If they had the courage
to follow the leading of their intuitions and to accept the Revelation, others would
follow and the progress of the Cause would be rapid and wide.
Unfortunately for themselves and for their country, neither one nor the other
of them proved willing to answer the divine summons. One evaded it, the other
ignored it.
Bitterly disappointed, the Báb returned in June, 1845, to

The Dawn-Breakers, p. 65.

*
Muḥammad ibn ‘Abd al-Mu‘ín ibn ‘Awn (1767–1858), was Sharíf and Imára (Emir) of Mecca
from 1827–1836, 1840–1851 (the Báb was in Mecca December 1844.
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 25
Persia. Already in many parts of the land the tidings of the New Faith had been
spread by these eager apostles, and had been warmly welcomed by the people.
Sundry officers of church and state were quick to suspect that this movement
boded them no good and they took alarm from the first. When the Báb went to
Shíráz and began there to propagate His Cause with immediate and marvellous
success, the Governor of the Province, moved with envy, ordered his arrest, cast
him into prison, and determined on his death. The Báb, however, was finally
released and permitted to go to Iṣfahán. Here again He instantly won the hearts
of the people. Thousands resorted to him to hear His Message. The priests were
stung by jealousy and seventy of them in solemn conclave condemned Him to
death for heresy. A friend, however, the Mu‘tamadu’d-Dawla, had interested
Muḥammad Sháh in the Báb’s Revelation, and by the Sháh’s order the Báb was
taken under escort to interview his Majesty in Ṭihrán. Shortly before He reached
the capital, He received from the Sháh a letter, written under the influence of the
Grand Vizier Ḥájí Mírzá Áqásí, in which the promised interview was indefinitely
postponed, and the Báb was relegated to a lonely fortress in the wild mountains
of northern Persia.
Now a deepening darkness rapidly gathered round the fading fortunes of the
Prophet. After nine months’ incarceration in Máh-Kú where His personality, as
by magic, won over the people of the neighbourhood, His jailers, and the warden
of the castle, He was transferred by His enemies, in April, 1848, to a still more
rigorous imprisonment in Chihríq.
At the same time, the persecution of the Bábís throughout the country was
intensified and attacks upon their persons and their property grew more general
and more violent. In October of that year, a number of believers in Mázindarán
seeking refuge from their assailants, withdrew to a disused fort, where they stood
at bay for months before their enemies, who were supported by the regular army
of the Sháh. In May, 1849, being promised that persecution would cease, they
gave themselves up and were at once seized and done to death by their perfidious
foes. Nine of the Báb’s apostles, including Mullá Ḥusayn and Quddús, with
26 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
numbers of other distinguished Bábís, perished in this massacre.
In March of the following year occurred the death of the Seven Martyrs of
Ṭihrán, an episode which has become notorious on account of the prominence of
the sufferers, their high character and the publicity of their execution.
Two months later, in Nayríz, a large party of Bábís retreating before their
tormentors were surrounded by their enemies and after a stout resistance were
destroyed, in circumstances like those of their fellow-believers in Mázindarán.
Their leader was Siyyid Yaḥyáy-i-Dárábí, known as Vaḥíd, one of the principal
dignitaries of the Persian church, and the most learned of all the Báb’s followers.
At the same time in Zanján, a similar investment of Bábí refugees occurred,
but on a much larger scale. As many as seventeen regiments of the regular army,
together with artillery, were employed on this occasion against the Bábís who
were led by another brilliant divine of Islám, known among the Bábís as Ḥujjat.
The Grand Vizier Ḥájí Áqásí, who had become the arch enemy of the Cause,
now concluded that the spirit of the Bábís could not be broken nor the reform
movement quelled so long as its Author remained alive. He determined therefore
to put the Báb Himself to death. Dispensing with the formalities of any legal
process, he, by use of the weight of his official position, had the Báb removed
from Chihríq to Tabríz and there summarily condemned to death without trial.
The sentence was carried out in the public square of the city, on July 9th,
1850. A curious circumstance delayed for a few minutes the actual execution.
The Báb, with a follower who was to die with Him, was suspended by a rope to a
wall, and the firing squad of 750 rifles delivered a volley at close range. The
heavy smoke obscured completely the wall and those who hung upon it. When it
cleared away, the two condemned men were found to have escaped injury. The
rope which bound them had been cut, and the Báb’s companion was seen to be
standing on the ground unhurt. The Báb had disappeared and was discovered in
His prison, whither He had returned to finish a conversation which
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 27
had been interrupted when his jailors came to lead Him out to execution.
The members of the firing party, terror-stricken at such a prodigy, refused to
lift their rifles again against the person of the Prophet, and the authorities were
obliged to summon another regiment to consummate their crime.
The news of their Lord’s martyrdom soon reached the Bábís standing at bay
in Zanján. They were stunned and horrified but not disheartened. Outnumbered,
they held out to the last limit of their strength; and when by force and guile their
resistance at last was crushed, hundreds of Bábís, men, women and children
passed through the red gates of martyrdom to the Great Beyond, and then
rejoined their beloved Master, who had travelled by the same road so short a time
before.
By the early autumn of 1850, the reactionaries had, as it seemed, cowed the
main body of the believers and had destroyed every Bábí that had shown any
capacity for leadership, except two only: Bahá’u’lláh who had espoused the
Cause from the first, and Ṭáhirih, the one woman-member of the nineteen
apostles.
Through the efforts of these two, and especially the activity of Bahá’u’lláh,
the Faith continued to make headway, until in August, 1852, an attack by a
deranged Bábí on the person of the Sháh gave the authorities a pretext for a
general slaughter of believers throughout the country, with the express aim of
exterminating the Faith. Ṭáhirih was martyred. Bahá’u’lláh with His dependents
was exiled for life.
At this point, when all was at its darkest, and when to all except a few
illumined spirits the light of the Cause of God seemed to be quenched for ever,
the first volume of Nabil’s Narrative closes.

Faith in God and in His Prophet is the great ideal of the entire action—the
sure touchstone to distinguish good from evil, truth from untruth. Righteousness
is extolled by the Báb and the highest standard of conduct demanded by Him of
His followers, but the purpose of Nabíl was no more to deal in the principles and
practice of ethics than to set forth a new theological system.
28 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
His purpose was to show how Faith had come back into the world and had
transformed those in whose hearts its flame was kindled. If his story is epic in
the elevation and sublimity of its subject matter, it is in its mood lyrical—a lyric
of Faith and of the love that Faith awakes. In the central foreground stands the
figure of the Báb. No space is given to sketching the historical, the social or
political background. There is almost no setting to the incidents, the minimum of
description, no account of the general circumstances of the time. All the figures
in the story, and they are to be counted by hundreds, are grouped around the Báb.
Those who choose to turn towards him are seen irradiated by the glory of their
Lord; the intenser their Faith the more brilliant the light in which they are bathed.
Those who turn away from Him lie in the horror of a darkness which deepens
with the gradations of their unbelief. If Nabíl did not set himself to write a
formally ordered history he produced a work which has the vital and informing
unity that belong to a composition having a single hero, a single theme and one
all-pervading dominant emotion. Everywhere in his book Nabíl sets forth Faith
as the first of virtues, the first step of man upon the highroad to the presence of
God.
Deploring the failure of one of Shaykh Aḥmad’s disciples to recognise the
real dignity of a Prophet of God, he comments:
His faith was weighed in the balance, and was found wanting, inasmuch as he
failed to recognise that He Who must needs be made manifest is endowed with
that sovereign power which no man dare question. His is the right ‘to command
whatsoever He willeth and to decree that which He pleaseth.’ Whoever hesitates,
whoever, though it be for the twinkling of an eye or less, questions His authority,
is deprived of His grace and is accounted of the fallen.
Mullá Ḥusayn himself, the Gate of the Gate, hardly showed the requisite
measure of submissiveness. He proposed to apply a test by which He would put
the Báb to the proof. “Had you not been my guest,” said the Báb to him
afterwards, “your position would indeed have been a grievous one. The allencompassing grace of God has saved you. It is for God to test His servants and
not for

The Dawn-Breakers, p. 15.
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 29
His servants to judge Him in accordance with their deficient standards.”
He told the first of his apostles whom He sent out: “Your faith must be as
immovable as the rock, must weather every storm and survive every calamity
….”
In his address to the others He said: “The very members of your body must
bear witness to the loftiness of your purpose, the integrity of your life, the reality
of your faith, and the exalted character of your devotion …. Heed not your
weaknesses and frailty; fix your gaze upon the invincible power of the Lord, your
God, the Almighty …. Arise in his Name, put your trust wholly in Him, and be
assured of ultimate victory.”
The apostles of the Báb spontaneously through the vigour of their own
intuition recognised and adhered to Him. He Himself when in Mecca standing
within the most sacred shrine of Islám approached the famous divine Mírzá
Muḥíṭ-í-Kirmání, and put his faith to the test with a definite categorical demand
…. “Verily I declare,” He said, “none besides me in this day whether in the East
or in the West can claim to be the Gate that leads men to the knowledge of God:
My proof is none other than that proof whereby the truth of the prophet
Muḥammad was established. Ask me whatsoever you please: now at this very
moment I pledge myself to reveal such verses as can demonstrate the truth of my
mission. You must choose either to submit yourself unreservedly to my Cause or
to repudiate it entirely. You have no other alternative. If you choose to reject my
message, I will not let go your hand until you pledge your word to declare
publicly your repudiation of the truth which I have proclaimed. Thus shall he
who speaks the truth be made known, and he that speaks falsely shall be
condemned to eternal misery and shame. Then shall the Way of Truth be
revealed and made manifest to all men.”
The great churchman was broadminded enough to perceive the truth of the
Báb’s pronouncement; else the Báb would not have approached him in that
manner. He did not dare to deny it. But neither on the other hand did he dare to
face the consequences of the public admission which the Báb demanded. He
procrastinated. He pretended acceptance and promised submission;

The Báb in The Dawn-Breakers, pp. 59–60.
idem, p. 87.
idem, p. 92.
idem, pp. 134–5.
30 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
then broke his word and fled. “I shall never depart from Medina,” he assured the
Báb, “whatever may betide, until I have fulfilled my covenant with you.” As the
mote which is driven before the gale he, unable to withstand the sweeping
majesty of the Revelation proclaimed by the Báb, fled in terror from before His
face. He tarried awhile in Medina and, faithless to his pledge and disregardful of
the admonitions of his conscience, left for Karbilá.
Some years later the Muḥíṭ, still tormented in conscience, attempted to
approach Bahá’u’lláh, the Báb being dead.
“Tell him,” was Bahá’u’lláh’s reply, “that in the days of my retirement in the
mountains of Sulaymániyyih, I in a certain ode which I composed set forth the
essential requirements from every wayfarer who treads the path of search in his
quest of truth. Share with him this verse from that ode: ‘If thine aim be to cherish
thy life, ‘approach not our court, but if sacrifice be thy heart’s desire, come and let
others come with thee. For such is the way of faith, if in thy heart thou seekest
reunion with Bahá; shouldst thou refuse to read this path, why trouble us?
Begone!’ If he be willing, he will openly and unreservedly hasten to meet me; if
not I refuse to see him.”
Once again, the Muḥíṭ’s courage failed. He refused to face the consequences
of a confession of faith, withdrew and died an unbeliever.
In prison, on the night before His martyrdom, the Báb subjected his three
devoted companions to a test of the most extreme severity. He was in a strange
elation of spirits. The sadness that for long had weighed him down on account of
the death of so many of his followers had vanished. The joy of His approaching
sacrifice, the sense of the certain triumph of God’s Cause, had dissipated every
sorrow. Turning to His disciples He expressed regret that He was to die at the
hand of an enemy instead of the hand of a friend. “Would that one of you,” He
said, “might now arise and with his own hands end my life.” They shrank at the
thought of taking a life so dear, so precious. Then one of them sprang to his feet
and said that whatever the Báb commanded he would do. His companions
interposed; and the Báb because he had shown himself ready to obey to the
uttermost, chose him to

Bahá’u’lláh in The Dawn-Breakers, pp. 137–8.
The Báb in The Dawn-Breakers, p. 507.
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 31
share on the morrow the crown of martyrdom with his Lord. On the next
morning, at the place of execution, he was tied in such a position that his head
reposed on the breast of the Báb, and by the violence of the fusillade the two
bodies were “shattered and blended into one mass of mingled flesh and bone.”

The New Revelation was oftentimes accepted not so much through
intellectual submission to an argument as through the inspiration of a spiritual
experience.
The Báb and His followers invited and welcomed scrutiny and careful
examination of His teachings; lectures by Bábís were frequently given and the
faithful were always ready to meet anyone in intellectual controversy. In some
important cases (as in that of the illustrious Vaḥíd and of Nabíl himself)
investigation played a great part in conversion. But logical conviction was
always supported or anticipated by a strong intuitive impulse. In very many
cases the divine illumination was seemingly perceived by the force of sheer
insight.
In his account of the call of the Eighteen Apostles Nabíl writes:
Each of the twelve companions of Mullá ‘Alí in his turn and in his own unaided
efforts, sought and found his Beloved. Some in sleep, others in waking, a few
whilst in prayer, and still others in their moments of contemplation experienced
the light of this Divine Revelation and were led to recognise the power of its
glory.
The conversion of Ismu’lláhu’l-Aṣdaq, a distinguished Bábí of Iṣfahán,
through a vision of the Báb (an experience not unparalleled in this chronicle) is
quoted in his own words.
Hearing Mullá Ḥusayn had come to Iṣfahán he sought him out and met him at
night in the home of Mírzá Muḥammad-‘Aliy-i-Nahrí.
I asked Mullá Ḥusayn to divulge the name of him who claimed to be the Promised
Manifestation. He replied, ‘To inquire about that name and to divulge it are alike
forbidden.’ ‘Would it then be possible,’ I asked, ‘for me, even as the Letters of the
Living, to seek independently the grace of the All Merciful and through prayer to
discover his identity?’ ‘The Door of his Grace,’ he

The Dawn-Breakers, p. 69.
32 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
replied, ‘is never closed before the face of him who seeks to find him.’ I
immediately retired from his presence, and requested his host to allow me the
privacy of a room in his house where alone and undisturbed I could commune with
God. In the midst of my contemplation, I suddenly remembered the face of a
youth whom I had often observed while in Karbilá, standing in an attitude of
prayer, with his face bathed in tears, at the entrance of the shrine of the Imám
Ḥusayn. That same countenance now reappeared before mine eyes. In my vision I
seemed to behold that same face, those same features, expressive of such joy as I
could never describe. He smiled as he gazed at me. I went towards him, ready to
throw myself at his feet. I was bending towards the ground, when lo! that radiant
figure vanished from before me. Overpowered with joy and gladness I ran out to
meet Mullá Ḥusayn who, with transport received me and assured me that I had at
last attained the object of my desire.

Of the call of Quddús, the last and greatest of the apostles, he writes: “The
next day in the evening hour as the Báb followed by Mullá Ḥusayn was returning
to His home there appeared a youth dishevelled and travel-stained …. Fixing his
gaze upon the Báb, he said to Mullá Ḥusayn: ‘Why seek you to hide Him from
me? I can recognise Him by His gait. I confidently testify that none beside Him
whether in the East or in the West can claim to be the Truth ….’”
The narrative continues.
‘Marvel not,’ observed the Báb, ‘at his strange behaviour. We have in the world
of spirit been communing with that youth. We know him already. We indeed
awaited his coming ….’
Of the inclusion of Ṭáhirih, the one woman among the apostles, Nabíl records
that “… we have seen how instinctively she had been led to discover the
Revelation of the Báb and how spontaneously she had acknowledged its truth.
Unwarned and uninvited, she perceived the dawning light of the promised
Revelation breaking upon the city of Shíráz, and was prompted to pen her
message and to plead her fidelity to him who was the revealer of that light.”

The Dawn-Breakers, pp. 100–1.
idem, p. 69–70.
idem, p. 70.
idem, p. 269.
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 33
The Message which the Bábís proclaimed was primarily one of faith. “Raise
the cry,” said the Báb to Mullá Ḥusayn, as He sent him out on his first missionary
journey; “Awake, awake! for lo! the Gate of God is open, and the morning Light
is shedding its radiance upon all mankind. The Promised One is made manifest;
prepare the way for Him, O people of the earth! Deprive not yourselves of its
redeeming grace, nor close your eyes to its effulgent glory.”

The appeal which the Message made was felt to be quite extraordinary and to
partake of the nature of Pentecostal fire. Nabíl expresses this very definitely in
his account of the progress of the Bábí movement in the province of Khurásán.
“There blazed forth,” he writes, “in the heart of Khurásán a flame of such
consuming intensity that the most formidable obstacles standing in the way of the
ultimate recognition of the cause melted away and vanished. That fire caused
such a conflagration in the hearts of men that the effects of its quickening power
were felt in the most outlying provinces of Persia.”
Their hearts aflame with this divinely kindled fire, the Bábís feared no
danger, were daunted by no terror, and yielded under no adversity. They endured
without a murmur manifold sorrows and sufferings. Indeed they counted it a
high and precious privilege to go through tribulation of their Faith’s sake, and
looked forward to persecution with joy.
“Ever since the beginning of this holy enterprise, upon which I have
embarked,” cried Mullá Ḥusayn, “I have vowed to seal with my life blood my
own destiny. For his sake I have welcomed immersion in an ocean of tribulation.
I yearn not for the things of this world. I crave only the good pleasure of my
beloved. Not until I shed my blood for his name will the fire that glows within
me be quenched.”
Those chiefly responsible for the attacks on the Bábís were the officials of the
state-church who owed their privilege and power to the ignorance and
superstition of the people and were quick to see that the onrush of this crusading
reformation movement would sweep them and all their depravities away for ever
unless it

Báb in The Dawn-Breakers, p. 85.
The Dawn-Breakers, p. 268.
idem, p. 67.
34 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
was instantly and remorselessly strangled. They used their influence to rouse
their fanatical followers in the name of orthodoxy against the innovators. A
supine and apathetic government made no effort to quell disorder or to prevent
violence. On the contrary, the officials of the state were inclined not only to
wink at but even to take part in the riots, the plunderings and the massacres. The
Bábís had no protection, no redress, no assurance or hope of justice. Before them
lay the clear prospect of ostracism, of spoliation and probably of torture and
death.
As one of the Bábís who were driven to say in Zanján in answer to the
denunciations of the Amír-Túmán: “God knows that we are and will ever remain
loyal and law-abiding subjects of our sovereign, with no other desire than to
advance the true interests of his government and people. We have been
grievously misrepresented by our ill-wishers. No one of the Sháh’s
representatives was inclined to protect or befriend us; no one was found to plead
our cause before him. We repeatedly appealed to him, but he ignored our
entreaty and was deaf to our call. Our enemies, emboldened by the indifference
which characterised the attitude of the ruling authorities, assailed us from every
side, plundered our property, violated the honour of our wives and daughters, and
captured our children. Undefended by our government and encompassed by our
foes we felt constrained to arise and defend our lives.”
Nothing that the armies of corruption could do acted as a deterrent to the
Bábís. Faith had quickened in their hearts so impetuous and unquenchable a
flame of heavenly love that earthly danger and suffering held no terrors for them.
As love prompted them, as their master bade them, they went forward on their
crusading way, proclaiming their belief, calling aloud the Glad Tidings,
summoning all men to give heed and not to remain blind to the light of so
glorious a Day. The foreknowledge of destruction heightened their enthusiasm
and intensified their activity.
Vaḥíd from the day he gave his adhesion to the cause, yearned to lay down
his life for his Lord’s sake, and testified to his joy

The Dawn-Breakers, pp. 565–6.
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 35
when before the siege of Nayríz he saw the longed-for day was approaching.
Mullá Ḥusayn when he had raised the Black Standard, before the siege of
Mázindarán commenced, knew what the issue would be, and warned his
followers in time.
I together with seventy-two of my beloved companions shall suffer death for the
sake of the Well-Beloved. Whoso is unable to renounce the world, let him now at
this very moment depart, for later on he will be unable to escape.
Ḥujjat shortly before his death, when he had just seen his own wife and child
killed by the enemy, testified to his own premonitions of suffering for the Báb’s
sake and to his joy therein.
“The day whereon I found Thy beloved one, Oh my God,” he cried, “and
recognised in him the Manifestation of thine Eternal Spirit, I foresaw the woes that
I should suffer for thee. Great as have been until now my sorrows, they can never
compare with the agonies that I would willingly suffer in thy name. How can this
miserable life of mine, the loss of my wife and of my child, and the sacrifice of the
band of my kindred and companions, compare with the blessings which the
recognition of thy Manifestation has bestowed on me! Would that a myriad lives
were mines, would that I possessed the riches of the whole earth and its glory, that
I might resign them all freely and willingly in thy path.”

The Báb early in His ministry knew the fate that awaited Him at its end. On
their return from the pilgrimage to Mecca, He said good-bye to His beloved
companion Quddús and told him sadly that they would not see each other again
on earth; that Quddús would soon meet a martyr’s death. But, He said, “on the
shores of the Great Beyond, in the realm of immortality, the joy of an eternal
Reunion awaits us … I, too, shall read the path of sacrifice ….”
Nor was this high, heroic spirit of devotion found only in the leaders, or in the
men; it was displayed likewise by women, by girls, by children, by all.
Ṭáhirih, that outstanding star of Persian womanhood, the one

The Dawn-Breakers, p. 326.
idem, p. 572.
The Báb in The Dawn-Breakers. p. 142.
36 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
woman-apostle of the Báb, of whom Professor Browne said that if the Bábí cause
had done nothing else, to have produced such a woman as her in such a time and
such a country would have made it illustrious—Ṭáhirih, beautiful, exquisite,
learned, eloquent, showed a courage and enterprise in spite of the disability of her
sex which made her conspicuous even among the Bábís; when her time of
martyrdom drew near she met it with rapture and endured a painful death with
dignity and calm.
Nabíl records how numbers of girls and boys and aged men in the siege of
Ṭabarsí or Nayríz or Zanján played their full part with the other Bábís in the
defence of the asylum to which they had been driven; how mothers would
encourage their children to suffer and to die rather than repudiate their faith; how
the protracted resistance of the Bábís at Zanján was due in no small measure to
the activity of the Bábí women who ministered to the sick and wounded, repaired
the barricades, sewed garments, baked bread, cheered the faint-hearted and
restored the faith of the wavering, while even the children showed the same
enthusiasm as their elders and did what their tender strength permitted to the
good of the common cause; and when at length the defenders were overwhelmed,
the women endured with steadfastness the cruelties heaped upon them till they
found release from their tormentors in a martyr’s death.
To the believer in the Báb and in Bahá’u’lláh this account of the Heroic Age
of the Faith is precious and moving beyond words: it inspires, it stimulates, it
fortifies.
But also to another class of readers (a class which at present, unfortunately for
the world, is much larger) this work of Nabíl’s has an extraordinary interest. It
claims the particular regard and deserves the most patient study of every student
of religious history and of everyone who believes in the reality of Divine
Revelation. For here in Nabíl’s work is a direct account of one of those august
events which occur at rare intervals in the progress of humanity and which are
fraught always with the most momentous consequences: the birth of a new
World Religion.
As the Bábí Faith is distinguished from all earlier religions in this respect, that
the knowledge of it spread almost instantly from
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 37
the East to the West; so this record which Nabíl made of its beginnings, holds in
the history of comparative religion a position in certain respects altogether
unique.

The world (no doubt through its own fault) has to lament that there has been
preserved so little authentic information as to the rise of the great Religions of
ancient times, as to the life and death of their Founders, as to the efforts and
heroisms and fate of their immediate followers. In nothing is the sad truth that
the world knows nothing of its greatest men more unhappily conspicuous than in
the meagreness of testimony concerning the Authors of the successive World
Revelations of the past.
The eager interest and loving reverence of the faithful have in later years
made so much of the little information that is available; deficiencies, too, have
been so well filled in by tradition, by legend or even by myth; and enthusiastic
scholars have so often assumed an air of certitude about matters which prove on
scrutiny to be merely conjectural, that there is current a gravely exaggerated idea
as to our real knowledge of the rise of any of the world religions prior to Islám.
The personality and the philosophy of Buddha seem to have charmed the
western world more than that of any other non-Christian prophet. Generous
tributes to the beauty and sweetness of his character and to the loftiness of his
spiritual wisdom are to be found in the writings of many a Christian divine, and
his teachings are accessible to the English public in a variety of popular editions.
Yet the immensity of Buddhistic literature serves only to set off the paucity of
contemporary or early written records and does not remove the obscurity which
hangs about the details of the Prophet’s life or the origin of his teaching. The fact
that some sceptical scholars have explained Buddha away as a sun-myth and have
questioned the antiquity of the Buddhist tradition is of no great interest save as
testifying to the uncertainty which subsists about the whole matter. One of the
best known English authorities (Mrs. Rhys Davies, Buddhism, pp. 171–19)
admits that the Pali Canon was not committed to writing till
38 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
80 BC (about one hundred and sixty years after the teaching had been introduced
into Ceylon; and four hundred years after the death of Buddha himself). She
concludes that the life of Buddha “as an historical fact is at least as well
demonstrated as that of the founder of any other religion of antiquity” and that
the story of his life “however draped and embroidered with myth and legend”
cannot be dismissed as historically untrue without “extravagant recourse to
forced interpretations and assumptions of improbable happenings.”

The New Testament has been the guide and inspiration of western religion for
nineteen centuries; but everybody must wish that extant accounts of the life and
teaching of Jesus Christ were less brief and fragmentary, and those who cherish
this wish most warmly are those who love Him best and seek to discern and
follow His way most earnestly. Of the early teachers of Christianity, the
confessors and martyrs of the first three centuries of our Era, we know much less
than about the Founder Himself. Many volumes were in those days written with
fine art and preserved with zealous care concerning the history of Rome, the
conquests of Caesar and the like; but the history of the Christian Faith was looked
on as a wholly inconsiderable matter. The cultivated world of that period had not
the least conception of the relative importance of the New Revelation. They did
not trouble to make any note of its development nor in those unruly and
indiscriminating times did they regard such records as the Christians themselves
made to be of sufficient interest to be preserved.
The meagreness of the information we possess about the age of the Christian
martyrs is lamented by the learned and conservative Mosheim. He writes: “The
actions and sayings of those holy martyrs from the moment of their imprisonment
to their last gasp were carefully recorded in order to be read on certain days and
thus proposed as models to future ages. But few, however, of these ancient acts
are come down to our times …. From the eighth century downwards several
Greek and Latin writers endeavoured to make up this loss by compiling with vast
labour accounts of
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 39
the lives and actions of the ancient martyrs. But most of them have given us little
else than a series of fables adorned with a profusion of rhetorical flowers and
striking images, as the wiser even among the Romish doctors frankly
acknowledge. Nor are these records that pass under the name of martyrology
worthy of superior credit since they bear the most evident marks both of
ignorance and falsehood. So that upon the whole this part of ecclesiastical
history for want of ancient and authentic monuments is extremely imperfect and
necessarily attended with much obscurity.”
Gibbon remarks in the fifteenth chapter of his history: “the scanty and
suspicious materials of ecclesiastical history seldom enable us to dispel the dark
cloud that hangs over the first age of the church,” and in a footnote to the
sixteenth chapter: “In the various compilations of the Augustan history (a part of
which was composed under the reign of Constantine) there are not six lines that
relate to the Christians; nor has the diligence of Xiphilin discovered their name in
the large history of Dion Cassius.”
Naturally we know more about the great figures of early Islám than about
those of other religions, for the Faith arose in more recent times, its extension
was amazingly rapid, and it developed within a very few centuries a culture of a
most brilliantly intellectual type. But our information concerning Muḥammad’s
personality and His teaching, about His immediate companions and followers,
seems to be scanty enough. It has not been sufficiently full or conclusive or
authentic to prevent an extraordinary variety of interpretation and belief as to
Muḥammad’s character and actions, and little of it has till very recently been
accessible to western readers. Gibbon scandalously caricatured the Prophet,
whom he called “an illiterate barbarian”. The genius of Carlyle moved him in
1840 to protest that “our current hypotheses about Mahomet that he was a
scheming impostor, a Falsehood Incarnate, that his religion is a mere mass of
quackery and fatuity, begins really to be now untenable to anyone. The lies
which well meaning zeal has heaped round this man are disgraceful to ourselves
only.” But this warning has been little heeded and western scholars may be
found to describe Muḥam-
40 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
mad as “a brigand chief,” and the like, even in this present century.
More than twelve centuries elapsed between the rise of Muḥammad and the
rise of the Báb whom He foretold; world-conditions in the interval changed and
progressed, and anyone who investigates the Bábí religion is enabled to learn the
true facts concerning the Founder and His immediate followers with a degree of
fullness and accuracy never before possible in human history. No earlier
Revelation is so well documented as this. It came to mankind at the same time as
the railway, the telegraph, the telephone. How great the significance of the little
casual fact that one of the very earliest English references to the Bábí Faith sets
forth the execution of the Bábís in 1852 as given in the Teheran Gazette of that
*
day! The Báb’s crusade was so vigorous, and it was shared by so many eminent
persons, that it attained the widest publicity in Persia and threatened to shake the
whole corrupt ecclesiastical system. Though the country was backward and
weak, yet Britain and Russia had there important imperial interests which brought
many foreign residents, official and otherwise, to the capital. Some of these were
sufficiently interested in the Movement to spread the knowledge of it in Europe.
Western references to the Báb date back as far as 1851, and have been (some on a
large and some on a small scale) continuous since that time. Some of the more
important of these references are to be found in Comte de Gobineau’s Les
Religions et les Philosophies dans l’Asie Centrale, and in Lord Curzon’s Persia
and the Persian Question.
Professor Browne, of Cambridge University, gives the names of four Persian
histories as adverting to the religion, one of them at great length, and has himself
in such works as A Traveller’s Narrative and Materials for the Study of the Bábí
Religion, made public a large amount of early information on the progress of the
Faith. Three volumes of the Báb’s own works have been translated by A. L. M.
Nicolas and published in France.

Amid the great and ever-growing library of works on the Báb,

*
Lady Mary Leonora Woulfe Sheil, Glimpses of Life and Manners in Persia, 1856.
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 41
the Chronicle of Nabíl’s holds a most conspicuous place. While it is informal
and unofficial; while it is not used by the Bahá’ís to determine any point of
teaching, yet it is as nearly as may be the Bábís’ own story of the Báb’s crusade.
It is not in a philosophic sense a history: it is not an ordered exposition of the
development of the Báb’s Revelation. Nabíl is as much an editor as an author.
He gathers items of information with care, industry and eager zeal for truth, and
pieces them together in their proper chronological sequence. For the most part he
sets forth this or that event as he had it from some believer who had taken part in
it, or had witnessed it, or had heard of it from an eyewitness. He enjoyed in his
labours the special help of some of the members of the inmost circle of the Faith,
including the brother of Bahá’u’lláh and the amanuensis of the Báb. Bahá’u’lláh
Himself saw a portion of the manuscript of Nabíl and expressed His general
approval and acceptance of it. It has in the fullest degree the character of a Bábí
Gospel. If we possessed an authorised and large scale account of the Acts of
Jesus Christ written by one of the Twelve and preserved in the form in which it
came from the author’s pen, we would have a Christian Gospel as authentic in its
sphere as this of Nabíl’s in its. Here with a distinctness and in a detail unequalled
in any early literature of the world we can examine the manner in which a Great
Revelation comes among men and can study the phenomena of a dawning Age of
Faith before any system of theology or of organisation has taken shape and when
the Prophet shows forth His majesty through the exertion of a quickening
spiritual power which awakes in the true-hearted an altogether miraculous
enthusiasm and courage and at the same time stirs the obscurantists and the
vicious to deeds of hate and fear and cruelty.
In this respect, the value of Nabíl’s work is enhanced by the fact that its
composition is itself one of the products of the Prophet’s creative power. The
spirit which impels the pen of Nabíl is the spirit of the other Bábís. His mental
attitude as an author is the same as that of the heroes who form his subject. Faith
in the Báb as the Prophet of God prompted him to undertake this work. Faith
sustained him to its completion. Faith
42 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
invigorates every sentence and word in it. As one reads one is conscious that the
outlook, the mood, the style of the book reflect the same eager, buoyant,
irresistible faith as inspires the lofty exploits it records. By a thousand proofs
Nabíl shows his desire to be fair and just to all; but at the same time he writes as
an avowed and eager and determined participant in a life and death struggle in
which neither side gives nor expects quarter, but which must be fought out to an
end. The temper of the writing resembles that of a battle song in which (even in
moments of what seem irredeemable defeat) the note of assured triumph
transcends all other notes.

The future will be better able than we to set events in their true perspective, to
appraise the value of the vast amount of historical material which the industry of
Nabíl has amassed and to judge the significance of these deeds of heroism and
self-sacrifice.
Yet there is one respect in which this work has a particular timeliness now,
which it will not have in the future. We live and long have lived in a twilight
age, and with deepening fear have watched the darkness close in upon us.
Religion, organised or not, has more and more lost its control over men’s
conduct, its hold upon their hearts. Churchmen are as little able as statesmen to
unravel the perplexities of the situation, to inspire hope for the future, to
formulate a plan for staying the general disintegration and for reconstructing an
adequate world order. Believers turn their sad thoughts back to the early days of
the Christian Faith. They stretch their longing hands far across the intervening
centuries to ancient Pentecosts—but in vain. They read in the Scriptures of the
miracles of courage and achievement wrought by the power of divine faith in past
ages. They turn to the Epistle to the Hebrews and light upon such a tribute to
Faith as this:
“And what shall I more say? For the time would fail me to tell of Gideon, and of
Barak, and of Samson, and of Jephthah; of David also, and Samuel, and of the
prophets:
“Who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises,
stopped the mouths of lions.
“Quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword,
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 43
out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the
armies of the aliens.
“Women received their dead raised to life again: and others were tortured, not
accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection:
“And others had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, year moreover of bonds
and imprisonment:
“They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the
sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute,
afflicted, tormented;
“(Of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in
mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.” (Hebrew 12:32–38.)
They wonder at the vision, the exultation, the prevailing power of the faithful
ones of old who, though they were in their own time little noted and obscure, yet
for all their apparent weakness could not be gainsaid but went forth in their
Master’s cause, removed mountains of doubt, uplifted the characters of men and
of peoples, and amid the ruins of an unhappy and decaying world inspired and
initiated the building of a new and greater civilisation. Christians to-day long
bitterly, despairingly, for that ancient Glory. But the chasm seems unbridgeable.
Between us and the comrades of the Christ a great gulf is fixed which none may
cross. Understanding and creative power were theirs. To us belong
bewilderment, frustration and despair.

The theme is victory
But to read Nabíl is to enter an utterly contrasted world. To peruse this
chronicle of events not yet a century old, to feel the warm glow of love and faith
and militant ardour with which the narration is suffused, to observe the character
of the Báb, in which the sweetest charm and humility are mingled with majesty
and power, is to pass suddenly into a realm of thought wholly different from that
in which we of the West so long have lived. As we read, we realise we are
following here the fortunes of people of our own time, whose outlook on life is
exactly that which
44 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
Christians once had but now have lost, exactly that of which we read in our
Scriptures and for which we repine in vain. Here, indeed, in this record is
darkness—spiritual darkness such as now gathers in the West, darkness awful
and immeasurable. But it lies only at the far circumference, at the outer edges of
the scene, not at the heart of things. It is darkness challenged, darkness routed,
scattered, put to flight and to eternal shame. The central place is held by light;
the theme is the victory of light. The darkness serves to set off the light by
contrast. It cannot reach nor touch the souls of the Bábís. In them there is no
perplexity nor apprehension. Human pain and failure are for them overpassed
and lost in a divine attainment. They did not trust human wisdom nor find as we
have done that it betrayed them. They trusted God wholly and for love’s sake
gave up all they had and were, that they might serve His Truth.
Whatever is base, unworthy, ignoble in human nature is not here glorified,
extolled, palliated, but held up to execration, destined to final defeat and
complete destruction. Glory and praise and dominion and the certainty of
triumph belong here to whatever in human nature is most lovable, most noble,
most sublime.
Here are men, women and children, a vast, motley, heterogeneous host of
young and old, learned and unlearned, the rich man and the poor man, the
aristocrat and the labourer: gathered into one indissoluble body not by any
outward compulsion or constraint whatever, but of their own free act and eager
choice. The tie that binds them is spiritual only—simply love for God—and is so
strong that no enticement or repulsion of the earth can break or loosen it. Neither
prison nor poverty, hunger nor thirst nor wounds could force them to desert their
comrades, deny their Lord or abandon His cause: severally, or in multitudes
together, they would face and welcome death, and give their lives, as their
Beloved Lord gave His, simply to serve the cause of God among men.
We need not go back to ancient Scriptures or to distant times, to the early
history of the Christian Church, to the Epistles to the Hebrews or to the Old
Testament, to rediscover that faith in God
Nabíl’s history of the Báb 45
which in our extremity seems lost beyond recall. We need not imagine that the
outpourings of God’s manifest power, the open vision of His Beauty, the ecstasy
of self-sacrifice in His cause, have passed away forever from the earth.
All these things are in our midst!
‘Abdu’l-Bahá
A study of a Christlike character
“No one, so far as my observation reaches, has lived the perfect life like Abdul
*
Baha ….”
TO LIVE TO-DAY in deed and truth the kind of life that Jesus of Nazareth led
and bade His followers lead; to love God wholeheartedly, and for God’s sake to
love all mankind, even one’s slanderers and enemies; to give consistently good
for evil, blessings for curses, kindness for cruelty and, through a career darkened
along its entire length by tragic misrepresentation and persecution, to preserve
one’s courage, one’s sweetness and calm faith in God—to do all this and yet to
play the man in a world of men, sharing at home and in business the common life
of humanity, administering when occasion arose affairs large and small and
handling complex situations with foresight and firmness—to live in such a
manner throughout a long and arduous life, and when, in the fullness of time,
death came, to leave to multitudes of mourners a sense of desolation and to be
remembered and loved by them all as the servant of God—to how many men is
such an achievement given as it has been given in this age of ours to ‘Abdu’l-
Bahá?
To the historian, the psychologist, the student of comparative religion, the
narrative in all its aspects has much to offer of interest and value. But to the
would-be Christian of the twentieth century the personal life and character of Sir
Abbas Effendi (more widely known as ‘Abdu’l-Bahá) make a direct and peculiar
appeal.
An ordinary man who has set himself really to follow the precepts of Christ
finds himself in special difficulties to-day. The very understanding and
knowledge of the will of Christ, as well

*
T. K. Cheyne, The Reconciliation of Races and Religions (London: Adam and Charles Black.
1914), p. 161.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá: A study of a Christlike character 47
as the performance of it, seem now less easy to attain than they were for our
forefathers. The accuracy of the Gospel record not only in phrase and detail, but
in larger matters likewise is, however unjustifiably, questioned by a number of
scholars. The record in any case is brief and fragmentary; and the utterances
attributed to the Christ are not only very few but so terse and epigrammatic that
their bearing is often uncertain and they admit of diverse interpretations. The
problems of the contemporary world, too, are so much more complex than those
of the period in which Christ lived that His words which suited so well the
conditions of the past are difficult to apply to the present. Those who profess
themselves the teachers of Christendom speak, as a whole, with such different
voices and offer such contradictory advice that there is much bewilderment.
Guidance from both the ancient book and from living example seems,
therefore, to the man in the street less easy to gain than it was once. And the
natural weakness of our nature which finds so arduous the moral life demanded
by Christ is no longer supported by custom and general opinion, but is, on the
contrary, unhappily enervated by the influence of a self-willed and flippant age.
In the story of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá the Christian comes upon something which he
ardently desires and which he finds it difficult to obtain elsewhere. There awaits
him here reassurance that the moral precepts of Christ are to be accepted exactly
and in their entirety, that they can be lived out as fully under modern conditions
as under any other, and that the highest spirituality is quite compatible with sound
commonsense and practical wisdom. Many of the incidents in ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s
life form a practical commentary on the teachings of Christ and dramatise the
meaning of the ancient words. Being a philosopher as well as a saint, He was
able to give to many a Christian enquirer explanations of the Gospel-ideal which
had the simple authority both of His consistent life and of their own
reasonableness.
Christ taught that the supreme human achievement is not any particular deed
nor even any particular condition of mind; but a relation to God. To be
completely filled—heart, mind, soul—with love for God, such is the great ideal,
the Great Command-
48 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
ment. In ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s character the dominant element was spirituality.
Whatever was good in His life He attributed not to any separate source of virtue
in Himself but to the power and beneficence of God. His single aim was
servitude to God. He rejoiced in being denuded of all earthly possessions and in
being rich only in His love for God. He surrendered His freedom that He might
become the bond-servant of God; and was able, at the close of His days, to
declare that He had spent all His strength upon the Cause of God.
To Him God was the centre of all existence here on earth and heretofore and
hereafter. All things were in their degree mirrors of the bounty of God and
outpourings of His power. Truth was the word of God. Art was the worship of
God. Life was nearness to God; death remoteness from Him. The knowledge of
God was the purpose of human existence and the summit of human attainment.
No learning nor education that did not lead towards this knowledge was worth
pursuit. Beyond it there was no further glory, and short of it there was nothing
that could be called success.
In ‘Abdul-Bahá this love for God was the ground and cause of an equanimity
which no circumstance could shake and of an inner happiness which no adversity
affected and which (it is said) in His presence brought to the sad, the lonely or the
doubting the most precious companionship and healing. He had many griefs but
they were born of His sympathy and His devotion. He knew many sorrows, but
they were all those of a lover. Warmly emotional as He was He felt keenly the
troubles of others, even of persons whom He had not actually met or seen, and to
His tender and responsive nature the loss of friends and the bereavements of
which He had to face more than a few brought acute anguish. His heart was
burdened always with the sense of humanity’s orphanhood, and He would be so
much distressed by any unkindness or discord among believers that His physical
health would be affected. Yet He bore His own sufferings, however numerous
and great, with unbroken strength. For forty years He endured in a Turkish
prison rigours which would have killed most men in a twelvemonth. Through all
this time He was, He said, supremely happy, being close to God and in constant
‘Abdu’l-Bahá: A study of a Christlike character 49
communion with Him. He made light of all His afflictions. Once, when He was
paraded through the streets in chains, the soldiers, who had become His friends,
wished to cover up His fetters with the folds of His garments that the populace
might not see and deride, but ‘Abdu’l-Bahá shook off the covering and jangled
aloud the bonds which He bore in the service of His Lord. When friends from
foreign lands visited Him in prison, and seeing the cruelties to which He was
subjected, commiserated with Him, He disclaimed their sympathy, demanded
their felicitations and bade them become so firm in their love for God that they,
too, could endure calamity with a radiant acquiescence. He was not really, He
said, in prison: for “there is no prison but the prison self”, and since God’s love
filled His heart He was all the time in heaven.
From this engrossing love for God came the austere simplicity which marked
‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s character. Christ’s manner of life had been simple in the
extreme. A poor man, poorly clad, often in His wanderings He had no drink but
the running stream, no bed but the earth, no lamp but the stars. His teaching was
given in homely phrases and familiar images, and the religion He revealed,
however difficult to follow, was as plain and open as His life. His very
simplicity helped to mislead His contemporaries. They could recognise the
badges of greatness but not greatness itself, and they could not see light though
they knew its name. He was neither Rabbi nor Shaykh, though He was the
Messiah. He had neither throne nor sword, though all things in heaven and in
earth were committed into His charge.
The life of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, too, was simple and severe. Familiar during much
of His life with cold, hunger and all privation, He chose for Himself in His own
home the most frugal fare. The room in which He slept (sometimes denying
Himself even the comfort of a bed!) served Him as a workroom too. His clothing
was often of the cheapest kind; and He taught His family so to dress that their
apparel might be “a comfort to the poor and an example to the rich.” The
household prayers which He held morning and evening were quite informal.
Partly from a natural modesty but also from a resolve to do

‘Abdu’l-Bahá in London, p. 121.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá in Star of the West, vol. X:1, 21 March 1919, p. 16.
50 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
nothing that might encourage in others a tendency to formalism, He objected to
any parade or unnecessary ceremonial, particularly if He were to be concerned in
it.
Even if some degree of circumstance and formality were called for, He would
reduce them to the smallest possible proportions. When, on April 17th, 1921, He
was to receive from Lord Allenby in the grounds of the Governor’s residence at
Haifa the honour of knighthood for services rendered to the people of Palestine
during the Turkish occupation, He evaded the equestrian procession and military
reception prepared for Him, by slipping unobserved from His house and making
His way to the rendezvous by some unaccustomed route. When all were in
perplexity and many thought that He was lost He appeared quietly at the right
place and at the right time and proceeded in the prescribed manner with the
essential part of the ceremony.
Of all material things, as of food, clothing, shelter, He sought and desired for
Himself the barest sufficiency. But ascetism was not part of His creed nor of His
teaching. “Others may sleep on soft pillows; mine must be a hard one,” He said
once in declining a kind friend’s offer of some little comfort for His room. Men
were to take what God had given them, and to enjoy the good things of nature;
but with renunciation. Fasting was a symbol, and as such had high value, but in
itself was no virtue: “God has given you an appetite,” He said; “eat.” Riches He
thought no blessing; if they had been, Christ would have been rich. The poverty,
however, which He inculcated was not impecuniousness but the heart’s poverty
of him who is so rich in love for God that he is destitute of all desire for aught
else.
He was the most unassuming of men. He counted himself personally as less
than others, put Himself below them and served them in every way He could find
with unaffected humility. He used to entertain at His table visitors from far and
near; but if the occasion were one of special importance He would rise and wait
on His guests with His own hands—a practice He recommended to other hosts.
When His Father was alive and dwelt outside ‘Akká among the mountains,
‘Abdu’l-Bahá used frequently to visit Him, and
‘Abdu’l-Bahá: A study of a Christlike character 51
though the way was long He habitually went on foot. His friends asked Him why
He did not spare Himself so much time and effort and go on horseback. “Over
these mountains Jesus walked on foot,” He said, “and who am I that I should ride
where the Lord Christ walked?”
But this humility did not come from any weakness. It was a proof of His
strength and a cause of His spiritual power. Once when a child asked Him why
all the rivers of the earth flowed into the ocean He said: “Because it sets itself
lower than them all and so draws them to itself.” Pride repels; humility attracts.
When commenting on Christ’s direction to be as little children, He emphasised
the fact that the virtues of children are due to weakness, and adults must learn to
have these virtues through strength. A palsied arm cannot strike an angry blow;
but the virtue of forbearance belongs to one who can, but will not. His humility
was not due to any diffidence or other failing. Nor did it imply any selfabasement or self-depreciation. What it meant was the obliteration of the
personal self. His separate ego had no existence at all save only as an instrument
of expression for the higher self that was one with God.
Somebody who knew Him in the West remarked that He was always master
of the situation, and amid the novel and alien surroundings of such cities as
London, Chicago and New York He preserved His self-possession and His
power. On one occasion in America, when He arrived at a house where He was
to be a guest at luncheon, a coloured man called on Him just before the meal
hour. Being known to the hostess the caller was admitted, but ‘Abdu’l-Bahá
observed that, according to the prevailing social custom, there was no intention of
admitting him to sit at the table with the regular guests. Now race-prejudice is
what ‘Abdu’l-Bahá could not tolerate: at His own table members of all races and
religions met on an equality as brothers. He was not going to countenance it
among His friends in America if He could help it. What was the surprise of the
hostess and of everyone else present when He was observed clearing a place
beside Him and calling for knives and forks for the new arrival. Before any
seemly way of countering his initiative was found, before
52 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
anyone had quite realised how it had happened, the lady found herself doing what
neither she nor any other hostess in her position would have dreamed of doing,
and entertaining at her table with her white friends a negro. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had
become the spiritual host. He spread before those who sat with Him the sense of
the common Fatherhood of God. Such was His radiant power that the
unconventional challenging meal passed off without unpleasantness or
embarrassment to any who partook of it.
When He was travelling in the West it was His custom to take out with Him a
bag of silver pieces to give to the poor whom He met; and being brought down
one evening to the Bowery Mission in New York He delivered there one of the
most compassionate and moving of His addresses. It reads in part as follows:
Tonight I am very happy for I have come here to meet my friends. I consider you
my relatives, my companions, and I am your comrade.
You must be thankful to God that you are poor, for Jesus Christ has said:
“Blessed are the poor.” He never said “Blessed are the rich.” He said, too, that
the Kingdom is for the poor …. Therefore, you must be thankful to God that
although in this world you are indigent, yet the treasures of God are within your
reach; and although in the material realm you are poor, yet in the Kingdom of
God you are precious. Jesus Himself was poor. He did not belong to the rich. He
passed His time in the desert, travelling among the poor, and lived upon the herbs
of the field. He had no place to lay His head, no home. … yet He chose this
rather than riches. … it was the poor who first accepted Him, not the rich.
Therefore, you are the disciples of Jesus Christ; you are His comrades ….
… Your lives are similar to His life, your attitude is like unto His, you resemble
Him more than the rich do. Therefore, we will thank God that we have been so
blest with real riches. And, in conclusion, I ask you to accept ‘Abdu’l-Bahá as
your servant.
At the end of the meeting ‘Abdul-Bahá stood at the Bowery entrance to the
Mission Hall shaking hands with from four to five hundred men and placing
within each palm a piece of silver. With no less tenderness He answered the need
of those whose poverty was spiritual. His guards and jailers, servants of a cruel
and despotic master, were won by His kindness and became His

‘Abdu’l-Bahá, The Promulgation of Universal Peace, pp. 32–4. [revised]
‘Abdu’l-Bahá: A study of a Christlike character 53
friends. “What is there about him,” people would say, “that He makes His
enemies His friends?”
Towards those who displayed to Him personal ill-will and malice He showed
forbearance and generosity. Missionary work, He said, is not promoted by being
overbearing and harsh; bad people are not to be won to God by criticisms and
rebukes, nor by returning to them evil for evil. On the contrary, the Cause of
God advances through courtesy and kindness, and the bad are conquered by
intercession on their behalf and by sincere, unflagging love. “When you meet a
thought of hate overcome it with a stronger thought of love.”
Christ’s command to love one’s enemies was not obeyed by assuming love
nor by acting as though one loved them; for this would be hypocrisy. It was only
obeyed when genuine love was felt. When asked how it was possible to love
those who were hostile or personally repugnant, He said that love could be true
yet indirect. One may love a flower not only for itself but for the sake of
someone who sent it. One may love a house because of one who dwells in it. A
letter coming from a friend may be precious though the envelope which held it
was torn and soiled. So one may love sinners for the sake of the universal Father,
and may show kindness to them as to children who need training, to sick persons
who need medicine, to wanderers who need guidance. “Treat ye the sinners, the
tyrants and the blood-thirsty enemies as the faithful friends and confidants of the
2 3
heart,” He would say. “Consider not their deeds; consider only God.” His
kindness was persistent and unflagging; He forgave until seventy times seven. A
neighbour of His in Haifa, a self-righteous Muslim from Afghanistan, who
regarded ‘Abdu’l-Bahá as an outcast, pursued Him for years with hate and scorn.
When he met ‘Abdu’l-Bahá on the street he would draw aside his robes that he
might not be contaminated by touching a renegade. He received kindnesses with
obdurate ill-will. Help in misfortune, food when he was hungry, medicine in
sickness, the services of a physician, personal visits—all made no impression on
his hardened heart. But ‘Abdu’l-Bahá did not relax nor despair. For five and
twenty years He returned continuously good for evil; and then suddenly the
man’s long hate broke down, his

“Sincerity and love will conquer hate.” ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Paris Talks, p. 29.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá in Star of the West, vol. VIII:11, 27 September 1917, p. 138.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá in Star of the West, vol. V:9, 20 August 1914. p. 130.
54 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
heart warmed, his spirit awoke, and with tears of disillusion and remorse he
bowed in homage before the goodness that had mastered him.
Even with enemies much more dangerous and cruel than this poor Afghan,
‘Abdu’l-Bahá showed the same forbearance and goodwill. He would suffer or
invite any personal loss or humiliation rather than miss an opportunity of doing a
kindness to an enemy; He would suffer calamity in order to avoid doing
something which might be to the spiritual detriment of an ill-wisher. When
‘Abdu’l-Bahá had been liberated, the misrepresentations of a secret enemy
resulted in His re-imprisonment. He might probably have secured His release by
a special appeal; but He declined to take this action. He went back to the prison
and was held there for years, one reason for this non-resistance to evil being that
the success of His appeal would but deepen the envy and degradation of His
enemy: “He must know that I will be the first to forgive him.” In this
submissiveness He acted in the same spirit as His Father in parallel
circumstances. For during the period when a certain jealous member of their
entourage was by various means covertly seeking His life, Bahá’u’lláh and all the
members of His family, including His eldest son, remained (so Professor Cheyne
records) on cordial relations with him, admitting him as before to their company,
even though they thus afforded him further opportunities of pursuing his deadly
designs.
So confident were all who knew ‘Abdu’l-Bahá that they could count on his
largeness of mind that even the Sháh of Persia, when in extremity and threatened
with revolution, stooped to ask the advice of the man he had kept in prison for a
lifetime, and received an assurance that if he would end despotism and establish a
constitution he might count on a happy reign, but that if he persisted in his
present path he would be dethroned. The Sháh neglected the counsel and brought
down upon himself the fate from which his generous prisoner would have
shielded him.
From his foot one may reconstruct Hercules, and from a few words and
incidents one may reconstruct a character. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá was no churchman; yet
His qualities clarify the Christian
‘Abdu’l-Bahá: A study of a Christlike character 55
ideal of manhood and help to prove for those who need such proof, how that ideal
applies to modern as truly as to ancient conditions of life and is no less within the
reach of active men to-day than it was in simpler times gone by.
Queen Marie of Rumania
and the Bahá’í Faith
AMONG THE BAHÁ’Í treasures in the International Bahá’í Archives at Haifa
there lies an exquisite and precious brooch, preserved as a memorial of the first
of the queens of the world who recognised and acknowledged the Revelation of
Bahá’u’lláh.
Queen Marie of Rumania did not hesitate about this recognition nor was she
diffident about giving it expression. She was at the time in bitter need, in
profound, overwhelming sorrow. The sweetness, the tenderness, the depth of
sympathy and helpfulness which she found at once in boundless measure in the
Divine Message made an instantaneous appeal and opened her heart to seek and
welcome the knowledge of its manifold beauty and truth. She felt the precious,
warm loving-kindness of the Heavenly Teachers, the perfection of their
understanding. Her soul was satisfied. Here at last was that for which she had
hungered. Here was peace, the reality of peace: a breath upon a fevered world
from that guarded inner shrine where peace has its inviolate home.
She was in bitter need. Those who were near and dear to her surrounded her
with love and sympathy and consolations; for they too knew grief and pain and
felt with one who suffered so acutely as she. But anguish of spirit had awakened
in her a desire for something other than the sincerest human condolence. She
faced the mystery of death and love. No word, no touch, however gentle, that
came only from a knowledge of this fleeting human life could suffice her now.
Loneliness had broken the hold of earth on her. She longed, as she had never
longed before, for God.
And God came.
Jesus Christ divided those to whom the Divine Message is communicated into
four classes: those who are too self-absorbed to receive any impression, those
who are able to receive only a shallow impression, and those who are deeply
impressed by the truth but are also impressed by things not true, and finally those

Queen Marie of Rumania and the Bahá’í Faith 57
who are single-minded in the love and service of truth. It was the unique
distinction of Queen Marie that, living in a special sphere where the cares of this
world and the deceitfulness of riches are at their maximum, she accepted and held
fast to the New Revelation. She was the first to walk in that narrow path in
which, when it is made broader, all the kings and queens and rulers of the earth
will follow her.
The time of an Advent is and ever has been an epoch of the severest test for
humanity. “Who may abide the day of His coming?” cried the ancient prophet;
“and who shall stand when He appeareth?” For none is the test so hard as for the
great and rich.
“Know ye in truth,” said Bahá’u’lláh, “that wealth is a mighty barrier
between the seeker and his desire, the lover and his beloved. The rich, but for a
few, shall in no wise attain the court of His presence nor enter the city of content
and resignation.” For none among the great and rich is the test so hard as for
royalty. Alone among those of royal blood, alone among her sister-queens,
Marie of Rumania recognised the dawning of the Day of Days and acclaimed in
Bahá’u’lláh the glory of the Father. Therefore this signal privilege has been
accorded her; and the ornament which she presented as a sign of gratitude to the
Bahá’í teacher who brought her the Divine Message is honoured with a place
among the holy relics of the early heroes of the Cause who first upheld among
man the Banner of the Manifest King of Kings.

Marie, the eldest daughter of the Duke of Edinburgh, was born in the purple;
but she had this special distinction that in her veins ran the blood of the only two
royalties to whom Bahá’u’lláh, when He announced His Advent to the world’s
rulers, addressed words of commendation. She was on her mother’s side the
granddaughter of Czar Alexander II, who abolished serfdom, and on her father’s
side of Queen Victoria; both of whom Bahá’u’lláh addressed in words different
from the stern or minatory terms used by Him towards the King of Prussia, the
Emperors of Austria and France, and the Sulṭán of Turkey and the Sháh of Persia.

The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, Persian No. 53.
58 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
She was herself an outstanding and radiant personality, vigorous and daring,
devoted to idealistic and humanitarian projects. A traveller who in 1909, before
her accession to the throne, visited her summer home in Sinaia, Rumania, at a
time when it was unoccupied by her, wrote afterwards in The Bahá’í Magazine:
We were deeply impressed with the spiritual atmosphere of her living apartment
furnished largely with her own handiwork, the carving of the furniture, the
paintings, the beautiful altar, all made by herself and all indicative of a deeply
spiritual nature. Her books, her thoughts, as one gleaned in a hasty passage
through her home, were such as to indicate the kind and spiritual ruler she has
become.
After her death, an old friend who had known her since they played as girls
together in Malta in 1888 wrote of her as follows:
No one who ever had the privilege of personal or intimate acquaintance with
Queen Marie could fail to be impressed by the greatness of her mind and spirit.
Her own life story reveals so well her ardent and joyous nature, the depth of
feeling that accompanied every thought and action …. The world is the poorer for
the passing of such a noble lady, and a blank, impossible to fill, is left in the lives
of those who knew her personally. She had passed through and suffered so much,
even her wonderful health was too sorely tried and we must be thankful in spite of
the great loss to us all that she is at rest and spared any further suffering. Her spirit
is surely near us still and we must try to follow her noble example of great
endurance and courage to face whatever may await us in these troublous times.
—(Lilian McNeil, World Order, IV,
10).
The first tidings of the Bahá’í Teaching were brought to her in the early days
of 1926 when her Majesty was in Bucharest and owing to personal sorrow was
living in retirement. Martha Root, the best known of the pioneers of the Faith of
Bahá’u’lláh, sent her a short note with a copy of Dr Esslemont’s Bahá’u’lláh and
the New Era. The Queen accepted the book and was at once so keenly interested
by its message that she sat up over it into the small hours, and the next morning
she sent an invitation to Martha

Queen Marie of Rumania in Star of the West, vol. XVII:3, June 1926, p. 84.
Queen Marie of Rumania and the Bahá’í Faith 59
to visit her in the Palace on the following day at twelve o’clock.
So quick and strong was the impression made through that interview that the
Queen gave it utterance that same year in many ways; public as well as private.
She found a ready response to her enthusiasm in the young daughter Ileana,
afterwards Archduchess Anton, to whom she taught these truths. She wrote to an
American friend of hers in Paris, “I have found all my yearnings for real religion
satisfied …. I am now ready to die any day full of hope; but I pray God not to
take me away yet for I still have a lot of work to do.” (Bahá’í World, VI, 580).
In May and in September, 1926, The Toronto Daily Star published from her
pen two glowing tributes to the Bahá’í Faith. “It is a wondrous Message,” she
wrote, “that Bahá’u’lláh and His son ‘Abdu’l-Bahá have given us. They have not
set it up aggressively, knowing that the germ of eternal truth which lies at its core
cannot but take root and spread …. I commend it to you all. If ever the name of
Bahá’u’lláh or ‘Abdu’l-Bahá comes to your attention, do not put Their writings
from you. Search out Their books and let Their glorious peacebringing, lovecreating words and lessons sink into your hearts as they have into mine.”
To The Philadelphia Evening Bulletin in September the same year she
contributed an article on the Faith in the course of which she testified expressly to
her acceptance of the truth of a succession of Revelations, a succession of
Prophets—“Christ, Muhammad, Bahá’u’lláh,” she wrote; continuing, “those
voices (of God) sent to us had to become flesh so that with our earthly ears we
should be able to hear and understand ….”
These three articles being syndicated were printed in nearly two hundred
American newspapers, and afterwards appeared in several newspapers in the
East.
The Guardian of the Bahá’í Cause gratefully acknowledged these spontaneous
appreciations. “Moved by an irresistible impulse,” he wrote in the Bahá’í World
for 1926–8, “I addressed her Majesty in the name of the Bahá’ís of both East and
West a written expression of our joyous admiration and gratitude for the queenly
tribute which her Majesty has paid to the beauty and nobility of the Bahá’í
Teachings ….”

Shoghi Effendi in The Bahá’í World, vol. VIII, 1926–1928, p. 273.
60 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
The following is the letter which he received in reply:
Bran, August 27th, 1926.
Dear Sir,
I was deeply moved on reception of your letter.
Indeed a great light came to me with the message of Bahá’u’lláh and ‘Abdu’l-
Bahá. It came as all great messages come at an hour of dire grief and inner
conflict and distress, so the seed sank deeply.
My youngest daughter finds also great strength and comfort in the teachings of the
beloved masters.
We pass on the message from mouth to mouth and all those we give it to see a
light suddenly lighting before them and much that was obscure and perplexing
becomes simple, luminous and full of hope as never before.
That my open letter was balm to those suffering for the Cause is indeed a great
happiness to me, and I take it as a sign that God accepted my humble tribute.
The occasion given me to be able to express myself publicly was also His work.
For indeed it was a chain of circumstances of which each link led me unwittingly
one step further, till suddenly all was clear before my eyes and I understood why it
had been.
Thus does He lead us finally to our ultimate destiny.
Some of those of my caste wonder at and disapprove my courage to step forward
pronouncing words not habitual for crowned heads to pronounce, but I advance by
an inner urge I cannot resist.
With bowed head I recognise that I, too, am but an instrument in greater Hands,
and rejoice in the knowledge.
Little by little the veil is lifting, grief tore it in two. And grief was also a step
leading me ever nearer truth, therefore do I not cry out against grief!
May you and those beneath your guidance be blessed and upheld by the sacred
strength of those gone before you.
Marie.
Martha Root also wrote to her Majesty, and in the reply which she received
were these words: “… The beautiful truth of Bahá’u’lláh is with me always, a
help and an inspiration. What I wrote was because my heart overflowed with
gratitude for the revelation you brought me. I am happy if you think I helped. I

Shoghi Effendi, Appreciations of the Bahá’í Faith, p. 9.
Queen Marie of Rumania and the Bahá’í Faith 61
thought it might bring truth nearer because my words are read by so many ….”
In the following year (1927) her Majesty gave another audience to Martha
Root; a third audience in 1928 when with her daughter the Princess Ileana she
was the guest of the Queen of Yugoslavia in Belgrade; and a fourth in 1929 in the
Summer Palace at Balchic. She contributed an encomium of the Cause, charged
with warm feeling and beautifully expressed, to the fourth volume of Bahá’í
World; and another more brief but not less significant to the fifth volume. “The
Bahá’í Teaching,” she wrote, “brings peace to the soul and hope to the heart. To
those in search of assurance the words of the Father are as a fountain in the desert
after long wandering.”
It had been for some time her Majesty’s wish and aspiration to visit in person
the sacred shrines upon Mount Carmel and to meet in person Shoghi Effendi. In
the year 1931 the opportunity, as it seemed, arrived. Accompanied by her
youngest daughter her Majesty travelled to the Holy Land and arrived at Haifa
with the intention of fulfilling her cherished desire. But fate had ruled otherwise.
Unfriendly influences intervened. She did not reach her goal. In a sad letter to
Martha Root dated June 28th, 1931, she told of her frustration and of the
unwelcome pressure to which she had been subjected.
“Both Ileana and I,” she wrote, “were cruelly disappointed at having been
prevented going to the holy shrines and meeting Shoghi Effendi; but at that time
we were going through a cruel crisis and every movement I made was being turned
against me and being politically exploited in an unkind way. It caused me a good
deal of suffering and curtailed my liberty most unkindly …. But the beauty of
truth remains and I cling to it through all the vicissitudes of a life become rather
sad.”
Early in 1934 her Majesty again received Martha Root in audience in the
Controceni Palace in Bucharest and expressed her delight that the Rumanian
translation of Bahá’u’lláh and the New Era had just been published in Bucharest
and that her people were to have the blessing of reading this precious Teaching.
In the course of the interview the Queen told of an incident
62 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
which had happened in Hamburg some months earlier when she was en route to
Iceland. As she was driving down the street a girl tossed into the car a little note,
and when her Majesty opened it she read the message, “I am so glad to see you in
Hamburg because you are a Bahá’í.”
Martha Root’s sixth and final interview took place in February, 1936 in the
same Palace, and was in some respects the most touching and significant of all.
Her Majesty spoke of various Bahá’í books, for she used to purchase them as
they came off the press. She spoke of the depth of the Íqán, and of the wonderful
radiant force of Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh. “Even doubters,”
she said, “would find a powerful strength in it if they could read it alone and
would give their souls time to expand.” She told how in London she had met a
Bahá’í, Lady Blomfield, who had shown her the message that Bahá’u’lláh had
sent to her grandmother, Queen Victoria. She told, too, of a dear friend of her
girlhood who lived in ‘Akká, Palestine, and knew Shoghi Effendi and had sent
from there pictures of ‘Akká and Haifa. This friend (Mrs McNeill) published
afterwards a letter which the Queen wrote to her at this time:
“Dear ‘little’ Lilian,” it began, “it was indeed nice to hear from you and to think
that you are of all things living near Haifa and are, as I am, a follower of the
Bahá’í Teachings. It interests me that you are living in that special house; the
Teachers so loved flowers, and being English, I can imagine what a lovely garden
you have made in that Eastern climate. I was so intensely interested and studied
each photo intently. It must be a lovely place and those south-eastern landscapes
and gardens attract me with a sort of homesickness ever since our Malta days.
And the house you live in, so incredibly attractive and made precious by its
associations with the Man we all venerate ….”
Four days after this, the Queen sent for The Bahá’í World, her last public
tribute to the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh. It was in due course reproduced in facsimile
as a frontispiece to Volume VI, 1936–38, and runs as follows:
More than ever to-day when the world is facing such a crisis of bewilderment and
unrest, must we stand firm in Faith seeking
Queen Marie of Rumania and the Bahá’í Faith 63
that which binds together instead of tearing asunder. To those searching for light,
the Bahá’í Teachings offer a star which will lead them to deeper understanding, to
assurance, peace and goodwill with all men.—Marie, 1936.
The end was drawing near. Her health undermined by her many troubles
began to fail. After some months of illness, in July, 1938, she passed away, and
leaving this world where for all her royal rank she had known so much of grief
and tears she entered that Great Beyond of which she had thought so often and so
deeply.
Her death and obsequies were attended with all the ceremonial that befits the
passing of a Queen. But who can tell what was the greeting that awaited her on
the other side where she learned in an instant how true had been her intuitions of
the Manifestation of God and where she saw unobscured now by any mortal veil
the white eternal splendour of the Truth that she, alone among the earth’s queens,
had risen to acclaim.
The Guardian of the Cause and the Bahá’ís generally recognised the
distinction of her spiritual station and the greatness of her service to the Cause.
In July, 1938, the Guardian on behalf of all the Bahá’ís sent a message of
condolence to her daughter the Queen of Yugoslavia to which her Majesty
replied expressing “sincere thanks to all Bahá’í followers.” To the Memorial
Service held in the Cathedral of Washington, DC, USA, the Bahá’ís of the United
States and Canada sent a tribute of flowers. The following sentences are from an
account of that ceremony:
“On July 25th, 1939, the first anniversary of the death of Queen Marie of
Rumania, an impressive memorial service was held in her honour at the Cathedral
of Washington in the national capital of the United States. In Bethlehem Chapel
on this midsummer afternoon national dignitaries and humble citizens paid loving
tribute to a royal personage whose name stands out with an especial lustre in the
history of her time. The spiritual beauty of the service expressed the character of
this noble Queen—the first member of royalty to embrace the Faith of
Bahá’u’lláh.
“Arranged by the Rumanian Minister, Radu Irimescu, the service was conducted
by the Reverend Doctor Anson Phelps
64 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
Stokes, canon of the Cathedral and former Secretary of Yale University. Among
the diplomatists present were the British, French and Italian Ambassadors and
representatives of other European embassies and legations. The Secretary of State,
Honourable Cordell Hull, headed the American delegation which included
government officials and representatives of the Army and Navy ….
“Directly opposite the altar in this intimate chapel stood the imposing floral tribute
‘from the Bahá’í Friends of America’—a cross ten feet in height with a ninepointed star at its centre. This emblem was designed by Charles Mason Remey
and presented in consultation with the National Spiritual Assembly. It was beside
the Bahá’í tribute that the Rumanian Minister stood at the conclusion of the
service to greet the audience as they passed out, according to the Continental
custom on such occasions.
“Not only did Queen Marie as the Dowager Queen of Rumania attest her faith in
the Divine Cause through private letters; she claimed the spiritual bounty of
calling the Teachings to the attention of others.”
In these dark and troublous times, this Day (or is it not rather this Night?) of
Judgment, when there is no open vision and when the gift of spirituality is not
esteemed, the connection of Queen Marie with the Bahá’í Faith may seem to be
but a small matter, the least episode among the multifarious activities of a
crowded and brilliant life. But when this sleep in which the world’s soul is
shrouded ends at last; when men’s spirits awakening behold the glories and the
bounties and the opportunities that have lain about them, unwelcome and
unregarded, all these many years, then they will look back upon the past with a
new and horrified understanding. They will gaze with amazement and
indignation and pity upon the incorrigible blindness of the mighty ones of Europe
who, despite the manifold warnings of God, led their people through misery upon
misery and flung them at last into the ultimate abyss of war. But amidst that
universal darkness of failure and misrule that fills the palaces and chancelleries of
the world men will see one solitary light shining in lone splendour and will
acknowledge the true majesty of that one redeeming soul whose high faith caught
and reflected far the glory of the breaking Dawn of God.
In later times, when the prophecies of the Bible are fulfilled
Queen Marie of Rumania and the Bahá’í Faith 65
openly before the eyes of all, when the New Jerusalem is established in the top of
the mountains and “the nations of them that are saved walk in its light and the
kings of the earth bring their glory and honour into it”; then men will see
treasured among the sacred relics of the first champions of the Bahá’í Faith one
royal ornament, a brooch of silver and diamond, the memorial of the first Queen
who recognised and acclaimed the Glory of Bahá’u’lláh; and the name and the
deed of Queen Marie of Rumania will be on the lips of men forever.
The call to God
A meditation
WHEN GOD CAME back into a world which had forgotten Him He sent as
His Best Beloved, the Báb, in whom the Spirit of Love was manifest with such
radiance that His disciples knew him as “the Ravisher of Hearts”. Bahá’u’lláh
Himself in that little volume, The Hidden Words, into which He has distilled the
essence of all revelations, teaches that before the foundation of the world God
knew His love for man and therefore created him. He breathed within man “a
breath of My own spirit”; “engraved on thee Mine image”, and bestowed on him
endless bounties. One of these gifts, Justice, is “the sign of my loving kindness”
since through its observance every man can win knowledge for himself.
The first demand which Justice makes on man is that he shall love his
Creator. “I loved thy creation, hence I created thee. Wherefore, do thou love me
that I may name thy name and fill thy soul with the spirit of life. … Love me, that
I may love thee. If thou lovest me not, my love can in no wise reach thee. … My
claim on thee is great: it cannot be forgotten.” Reunion with God is man’s
heavenly home. The love of God in man’s Paradise. It is his stronghold, in
which, if he enter in, he shall be safe and secure—But if he turn away therefrom
he “shall surely stray and perish.”
Righteousness has two supports—both spiritual. One is the love of God—
”Walk in My statutes for love of Me ….” The other is the fear of God, without
the restraint of which and the knowledge of the certainty of retribution, the
selfishness of man could not be held in control. “We have admonished our loved
ones,” writes Bahá’u’lláh, “to fear God, a fear which is the fountain head of all
goodly deeds and virtues. … The fear of God … is the chief cause of the
protection of mankind, and the supreme

The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, Arabic Nos 19, 3 & 2.
idem, Nos 4, 5 & 20.
idem, No. 9.
idem, No. 38.
The call to God: A meditation 67
instrument for its preservation.”
‘Abdu’l-Bahá frequently adverted to the close relationship between faith and
morality. For instance He wrote
“By Faith is meant, first, conscious knowledge, and second, the practice of
good deeds. … Although a person of good deeds is acceptable at the Threshold
of the Almighty, yet it is first ‘to know’ and then ‘to do’.” “The cause of eternal
glory to man,” He writes, “is faith and certainty and then living (or acting)
according to the behests of His Majesty the Eternal God.” God requires good
deeds from one who loves Him. “Neglect not My commandments if thou lovest
My beauty ….”
Through Faith and Righteousness, we are taught (and not without them) the
world may be united. For the virtues are the means by which people are enabled
to live together in peace and happiness. Generally speaking, whatever tends to
harmony is right, and whatever promotes discord is wrong. Integrity, loyalty,
fidelity, kindness, forbearance, mercy, generosity, trustworthiness, equity,
hospitality, and the like, all tend to social concord, well-being and unity. If the
scope and field of the virtues be not walled in by prejudices or bigotry, but
expand without hindrance, then they will find their natural goal in uniting all the
peoples of the globe. Faith will attract the help of the Holy Spirit without which
the division forces of earth life cannot be mastered; and faith and the knowledge
of God will alone be able to end that fierce struggle for existence which ‘Abdul
Bahá calls “the fountain-head of all calamities and the supreme affliction.”
For Faith is a “divine elixir” which “transmuteth the souls of men.” When a
believer turns in faith towards God, a profound change in his being is wrought
through which he becomes a “new creature”. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá likens this change to
the ante-natal process whereby spiritual forces surrounding the body of an infant
as it is formed before birth gradually permeate it according to the degree of its
receptivity. Similarly a believer’s faith draws about him the everlasting bounties
of God which he by degrees appropriates into his being according to the measure
of his capacity and of the spiritual preparation he has made. Man’s natural
condition is that of an animal: until he is born again from this and detached

Bahá’u’lláh, Epistle to the Son of the Wolf, pp. 135 & 27. [revised]
‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Tablets of Abdul-Baha Abbas, vol. 3, p. 549.
idem, p. 667.
The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, Arabic No. 39.
Selections from the Writings of ‘Abdu'l-Bahá, p. 302.
Bahá’u’lláh, The Kitáb-i-Íqán, p. 156.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá in Bahá’í World Faith, p. 324.
See Tablets of Abdul-Baha Abbas, vol. 1, p. 157.
68 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
from the world of nature he remains essentially an animal, “and it is the
teachings of God which convert this animal into a human soul.”
The soul is an intermediary between the spiritual world and the material
world. In its higher aspect it looks up toward the Kingdom of Glory, in its other
aspect it looks downward, toward the lower sphere where darkness and ignorance
have their home. If spiritual light be poured down upon this lower phase of the
soul and if the soul be able to receive it, then the truth is made clear and
falsehood is of short duration. But if such light does not come or is not accepted,
then darkness gathers about the soul from all directions, it is cut off from the
spiritual world and remains in the lowest depths.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá used the picture of the “Waxing of the Moon” to illustrate the
gradualness of this heavenward conversion and detachment from the world. The
believer when first he turns to God and receives his light is like the crescent
moon which is illumined on its sunward side but has the face it turns to earth still
in shadow. When the moon is full, and, turning to the sun’s light the same face it
turns to earth, is illumined throughout its whole circumference so that no shadow
anywhere remains, it becomes a type of the spiritually mature soul. The reality
of this severance is shown by a remark attributed to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá—”The Holy
Spirit moves my limbs.”
The results of spirituality, the full meaning of reunion with God, are not,
however, made known to man fully till the Hereafter. “Sorrow not if, in these
days and on this earthly plane, things contrary to your wishes have been
ordained and manifested by God, for days of blissful joy, of heavenly delight are
assuredly in store for you. Worlds, holy and spiritually glorious, will be unveiled
to your eyes.”
The purpose of earth life is to acquire the qualities that will be needed in those
other worlds: as “the knowledge and the love of God; faith, sanctity, spirituality,
eternal life.”
To a “pure, kindly and radiant heart” is promised “a sovereignty ancient,
imperishable and everlasting.” Could man behold that

Tablet to the Hague in Selections from the Writings of ‘Abdu'l-Bahá, p. 303.
See Tablets of Abdul-Baha Abbas, vol. 3, p. 661.
See Tablets of Abdul-Baha Abbas, vol. 1, pp. 108–9.
idem, vol. 3, p. 601.
Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 329.
The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, Arabic No. 1
The call to God: A meditation 69
immortal sovereignty, he would “strive to pass from this fleeting world!”
But the journey to God is not easy to accomplish. God is a jealous God. “Ye
shall be hindered from loving Me and souls shall be perturbed as they make
mention of Me. For minds cannot grasp Me nor hearts contain Me.” Man must
face a conflict in his own soul: “If thou lovest Me, turn away from thyself; and if
thou seekest My pleasure regard not thine own …. There is no peace for thee
save by renouncing thyself and turning unto Me ….”
Only through the energy of his own volition may the hidden powers of his
being be developed. Again and again man is called on “to make an effort”. He is
reminded that the greater his endeavour to cleanse and refine the mirror of his
heart, the more faithful will be the reflection in it of the glory of the names and
attributes of God, and that as a result of the exertion of his own spiritual faculties,
he will be able to “attain the courts of everlasting fellowship.”
At the present time the way to God is particularly hard to find. For it is the
Day of Judgment. Mankind has been “taken unawares”, as Christ foretold it
would be. God can only be known through His Messenger; and now there is a
New Era, a New Advent, a New Messenger. Old forms and names do not avail
now. Souls are being tested by their readiness to acknowledge the New
Manifestation of God—as the Mosaists were tested by the advent of Christ. Men
are being divided by God: some are taken, others left. All behold the light; only
the spiritual see its source. All men recognise a transition; only the spiritual
understand its meaning.
But no soul, no Age is tested beyond its powers. To those who seek to turn to
God, inspiration adequate to every demand is given. Great as have been the
bounties poured forth from heaven in past Advents, those of to-day are greater
far. Both in the Gospel and the Apocalypse the overwhelming weight of this
Second Coming and the victory of the righteous over the infidel have been
foretold. A power above the ken of men and angels, we are assured, now
enforces men’s obedience to the will of God.

The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, Persian No. 41.
idem, Arabic No. 66.
idem, Nos 7 & 8
Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 262.
70 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
The teachings on the spiritual life are such as beseem the age of man’s
maturity, when every soul is required to investigate the truth for himself. They
are given in plain terms, not in “proverbs”. They are authentic, being the written
word of Bahá’u’lláh or ‘Abdul Bahá. They are not of doubtful interpretation.
They are voluminous and comprehensive, offering diverse approaches to
knowledge and being adapted to diverse temperaments. Owing to the labour of
various translators and predominantly to that of the Guardian, many of these
teachings are accessible in English.
The earliest and perhaps (it is said) the greatest of Bahá’u’lláh’s revelations
on the Search for God is a little mystical treatise: “The Seven Valleys”. The
thought is subtle and profound; the idiom is oriental; but yet the book has a
beauty, a charm and a rapture which have made it the dearest treasure of many a
believer. It is the love-story of one who being separated from his beloved seeks
far and long, eagerly, patiently, despite all hardships and through all vicissitudes
for the one and only object of his desire; and at last attains his goal in a union
which will know no separation or end—“For when the true lover and devoted
friend reacheth the presence of the Beloved, the radiant beauty of the Loved One
and the fire of the lover’s heart will kindle a blaze and burn away all veils and
wrappings. Yea, all that he hath, from marrow to skin, will be set aflame, so that
nothing will remain save the Friend.”
The story is one of a journey. But though we read of ‘valleys’, ‘cities’,
‘heights’, ‘fields’, ‘gardens’, yet it is made clear the changes of scenery are
inward changes of emotion, of sensibility and the like. The traveller passes from
ignorance to knowledge, from illusion to discernment; love deepens, is cleansed,
intensified, uplifted; wisdom yields to greater wisdom; joy trembles and is lost to
make way for finer joy. The “Seven Valleys” are seven experiences or groups of
experiences which all must pass through who would travel this way to the end.
The story is lyric rather than dramatic. Though it is (like Bunyan’s
masterpiece) an allegory of a pilgrimage to a Celestial City, there are no lions,
nor giants in the way here, no Doubting Castle, no Vanity Fair. The enemies of
the traveller dwell within his heart. Evil is a negation, an imperfection. Nor is
the journey

Bahá’u’lláh, The Seven Valleys in Call of the Divine Beloved, p. 14.
The call to God: A meditation 71
lonely: the Beloved’s presence is felt from the beginning, the Messenger of Love
is the pilgrim’s guide throughout: The moving impulse of the journey is not
solely the traveller’s own; the voice of his Beloved calls ever in his heart “seek
thou no shelter save in the Sheba of the well-beloved”, and he is drawn onwards
to the happy ending by a power not his own.
How far away these valleys from the earth we know to-day! How far these
aims, this search from the pursuits and projects of men and peoples now. Yet we
are given to understand that only by adopting “The Hidden Words” as the
standard of right living and “The Seven Valleys” as a guide to human conduct
will society be empowered to inaugurate the Most Great Peace.
The Obligatory Prayers are given to help a Believer in this search. They are
not concerned with the objects so familiar at this time—as the expansion of the
cause, the giving of the message, the unifying and pacification of the peoples.
No. They are designed to be used daily by Bahá’í of all degrees for generations
and centuries to come. They are about that which Bahá’u’lláh wishes to be the
essence and constant centre of Bahá’í devotion and thought. Comprehensive and
complex they may be: but their subject is one and simple. It is the knowledge
and the love of God.
The Short Prayer states the whole matter in a word: “Thou has created me to
know Thee and to worship Thee.”
The Medium Prayer is more particular. It specifies in two verses the fact of
the Manifestation. The first verse presents this in its transcendent aspect,
proclaiming God’s Advent and His Sovereignty. The second acknowledges His
omnipresence and unity, gives the substance of His Revelation and remembers
the champions of the Faith.
The Long Prayer develops the theme still more fully and deeply. It seeks the
vision of God’s Beauty, an approach to His presence, an eternity of progress in
His knowledge. The main phases of the thought seem to be Self-Surrender,
Confirmation, Adoration and Thanksgiving, Penitence, and Trust in forgiveness
and redemption through the special graces of this Dispensation. While this Long
Prayer has one definite, elevated subject,

The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, Persian No. 1.
72 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
believers have found that they can apply it, or major parts of it, to a special crisis
or a special act in their own lives and can thus the better understand the Prayer
and spiritualise their problems.
How marked and how significant, on the one side the correspondence and on
the other the contrast that exist between this prayer of the New Age and the
Lord’s Prayer which Christians have been repeating for nineteen centuries. Here
is reflected the continuity of the work of Christ and Bahá’u’lláh and the Oneness
of their common purpose. Here, too (in an hour when many fear Christ has
thrown away His teaching on an unworthy race), is a testimony to the ultimate
success of His glorious ministry and sacrifice.
The first petitions of the Lord’s Prayer are for the coming of the Kingdom of
God on earth.
The Obligatory Prayers imply and declare that the Kingdom has come: for
instance “the All-Possessing is come. Earth and heaven, glory and dominion are
God’s …” and “He who hath been manifested is the Hidden Mystery … through
whom the letters ‘B’ and ‘E’ have been joined and knit together …” (that is,
mankind’s true existence begins in the New Era).
The Lord’s Prayer remembers a prophecy and a promise; and centres men’s
attention on a triumphant future on earth. The Obligatory Prayers contain no
prophecy and aim at an inward spiritual attainment.
Christ’s Prayer is social in form. It is suited to spiritual children, being very
simple and largely practical. In the words “as we forgive those who trespass
against us” it adverts to the virtue of personal mercy to which Christ gave special
prominence.
The Prayer of Bahá’u’lláh is personal and mystical, advanced in character and
suited to a maturer race. It carries the idea of communion and unity far, invoking
in the Long Prayer all the Prophets of the Ages, interceding for the past heroes of
the Faith, and joining the worshipper’s testimony to this Era and its Prophet with
the testimony of those in the highest heaven and of the Tongue of Grandeur itself
as well as with that of all creation.
Besides these and similar prayers, the Guardian has given us in the volume
Prayers and Meditations a number of other prayers
The call to God: A meditation 73
of a different origin—prayers made by Bahá’u’lláh for His own use, acts of
communion between the Prophet Himself and the Most High.
To these a special mystery attaches, as He Himself affirms (p. 282), and they
are bequeathed to us by His particular grace. They offer us a new approach to the
knowledge of God, and constitute perhaps the highest point we can attain in our
mystical contemplation of the Prophet’s ministry.
Some of these pieces are ascriptions to the power, the exaltation and the
munificence of God. Others deal with His creative and redemptive work. Others
belong to dramatic moments in His struggle against the evil forces of His
environment. The range of thought and emotion which we find in them far
outreaches ordinary human experience. On the one hand it soars to unimagined
heights of adoration and triumph and joy. On the other, it plumbs depths of such
anguish as only the truest love could know. But whatever the subject or the
occasion of these prayers they all are one continuing diverse song of selfsurrender and praise and thanksgiving to God. From every page—now in phrase
or in sentence or paragraph or sometimes in a whole long prayer of glowing and
sustained emotion—pour forth tributes of adoration magnifying the eternal
Beauty of Him whose love gives sustenance to the universe and who with one
least drop from the infinite ocean of his Mercy now redeems and beatifies
mankind.
Love for God inspires every thought and deed. “In Thy path, and to attain
Thy pleasure, I have scorned rest, joy, delight. … I have wakened every morning
to the light of Thy praise and Thy remembrance, and reached every evening
inhaling the fragrance of Thy mercy. … The fire of Thy love that burneth
continually within me hath so inflamed me that whoever among Thy creatures
approacheth me, and inclineth his inner ear towards me, cannot fail to hear its
raging within each of my veins.” “Nothing whatsoever can withhold me from
remembering Thee, though all the tribulations of earth were to assault me from
every direction. All the limbs and members of my body proclaim their readiness
to be torn asunder in Thy path and for the sake of Thy pleasure, and they yearn to
be scattered in the dust before

Bahá’u’lláh, Prayers and Meditations, pp. 103–4 & 269–7o.
74 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
Thee. O would that they who serve Thee could taste what I have tasted of the
sweetness of Thy love.” Upborne by this love He counts toil in God’s cause to
be “blissful repose, every anguish a fountain of gladness.”
He testifies to the Majesty of the Station held by Him; to the profound and
subtle changes in this created world, through which this New Age, the Age of
God, was brought into being (p. 295); to the supremacy and triumph of the
Revelation (p. 275) and to the eclipse of man’s wisdom and the collapse of his
power and of his knowledge before the manifest glory and dominion of the Most
High. (p. 53.) He gives a picture, unprecedented and unparalleled, of that
spiritual illumined world which He is building, the world ordained by God of old
which now is to be realised—a world so incomparable to ours that though we
read the divine description of it, our aspirations can form as yet no image of its
unity, its felicity or its attainments.
One and all, these prayers have for their immediate background and occasion
the events of his life and ministry. Dates are not given, nor circumstances. But
the prayers evidently cover many dynamic years of intense and extraordinarily
varied personal activity—the period during which He regathered the stricken
Bábís, reanimated their faith, laid broad and deep in men’s hearts the foundations
of the Bahá’í Cause, and in spite of successive and accumulating difficulties, in
spite of the oppression of priests and tyrants, the machinations of traitors and the
lethargy of the public, in spite of sorrows, sufferings and frustrations beyond
number, declared His Mission, proclaimed it to the Kings of the World and went
down to His last long imprisonment in the city of Acca.
The splendour of His power, His constancy, His spirituality, shines out
against the unremitting darkness of His earthly lot. For ever His human self
complains and expostulates with Him under the weight of ceaseless affliction:
“My blood at all times addresseth Me saying: ‘O Thou who art the Image of the
Most Merciful! How long will it be ere Thou riddest me of the captivity of this
world …?’ … To this I make reply: ‘Be thou patient …. The things thou desirest
can last but an hour. As to me, however, I quaff continually

Bahá’u’lláh, Prayers and Meditations, pp. 151–2.
idem, p. 136.
idem, pp. 58, 184, etc.
The call to God: A meditation 75
in the path of God the cup of His decree, and wish not that the ruling of His will
should cease to operate …. Seek thou my wish and forsake thine own.’” (p. 11)
His abasement causes His friends to weaken and His enemies to rejoice. Yet He
has Himself chosen this suffering (p. 278) and wishes life could be prolonged that
He might suffer more for love of God. His afflictions increase His love and His
redeeming power. (pp. 146–7) He gives no sign of personal resentment: quite
the contrary. (p. 307) But He prays for the vindication of the Faithful and the
punishment of those who oppose God and His Truth. “Well-beloved is Thy mercy
unto the sincere among Thy servants, and well-beseeming Thy chastisement of
the infidels …. Abase Thou, O my Lord, Thine enemies, and lay hold on them
with Thy power and might, and let them be stricken with the blast of Thy wrath.”
(pp. 141, 121.)
Here in this devotional record may be traced the spiritual creation and the first
ideal beginnings of the New Age and its glories. Here is fought and won in the
heart and soul of the Prophet that battle which established for us the Victory of
God on earth. Here is invoked that wrath of an outraged Deity which now
overwhelms mankind in its cleansing fires.
As one contemplates the awfulness of the tragedy unfolded in these pages: as
one ponders over this intimate revelation of the impassioned love, the wrongs, the
sufferings of Him by Whose stripes we are healed and who for our redemption
endured the abominations of the world: the Call to God sounds with a new
appeal, and one hears with a new realisation and a new resolve the summons of
the All-Victorious.
Hear Me, ye mortal birds! In the Rose Garden of changeless splendour a Flower
hath begun to bloom, compared to which every other flower is but a thorn, and
before the brightness of Whose glory the very essence of beauty must pale and
wither. Arise, therefore, and, with the whole enthusiasm of your hearts, … of your
will, and the concentrated efforts of your entire being, strive to attain the paradise
of His presence, and endeavour to inhale the fragrance of the incorruptible
Flower, to breathe the sweet savours of holiness, and to attain a portion of this
perfume of celestial glory. Whoso followeth this counsel will break his chains
76 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
asunder, will taste the abandonment of enraptured love, will attain unto his heart’s
desire, and will surrender his soul into the hands of his Beloved. Bursting through
his cage, he will, even as the bird of the Spirit, wing his way to his holy and
everlasting nest.320–1
Night hath succeeded day, and day hath succeeded night, and the hours and
moments of your lives have come and gone, and yet none of you hath, for one
instant, consented to detach himself from that which perisheth. Bestir yourselves,
that the brief moments that are still yours may not be dissipated and lost. Even as
the swiftness of lightning your days shall pass, and your bodies shall be laid to rest
beneath a canopy of dust. What can ye then achieve? How can ye atone for your
past failure?
The everlasting Candle shineth in its naked glory. Behold how it hath consumed
every mortal veil. O ye moth-like lovers of His light! Brave every danger, and
consecrate your souls to its consuming flame. O ye that thirst after Him! Strip
yourselves of every earthly affection, and hasten to embrace your Beloved. With a
zest that none can equal make haste to attain unto Him. The Flower, thus far
hidden-from the sight of men, is unveiled to your eyes. In the open radiance of His
glory He standeth before you. His voice summoneth all the holy and sanctified
beings to come and be united with Him. Happy is he that turneth thereunto; well
is it with him that hath attained, and gazed on the light of so wondrous a
countenance.

Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 320–2.
The letters of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá
*
THESE TABLETS ARE A fountain of heavenly love and joy, of wisdom and
power. In every volume, the ceaseless, boundless Love of God pours forth like
wine into a thousand different vessels: changing its form, taking the shape of
many occasions, filling exactly many needs, but never changing the exquisiteness
of its beauty. Love, spontaneous and unstinted, floods every utterance of
thought. There is no check, no limit. The days when these letters were written
were early days, the days of the first meetings of Lovers and Beloved, the days of
God’s welcome to the first believers of the western world.
“This is the time of happiness; it is the day of cheerfulness and exhilaration.”
He writes. “… with a heart overflowing with the love of God, pray to God with
all joy, and thank thou God for this guidance this high gift. “Should ye realize in
what a state this Tablet is written, assuredly ye will soar heavenward with joy
and exultations ….” (pp. 320, 182 & 440) ‘Abdu’l-Bahá at the time of writing
these letters was in prison. He was misrepresented, humiliated, frustrated; His
life was in danger; difficulties had to be met every hour. Yet no personal distress
affects for a moment in the least degree His inward peace of heart or weakens the
delight of His fellowship with those who begin to share His love for God.
Whatever sorrow there be in these pages is not for Himself but is through the
intensity of His sympathy with the griefs of those to whom He writes. His heart
“is filled with the love of God, is free and isolated from all save God, is illumined
and overflowing with the bounties of the Kingdom of al-Abhá.” (p. 713.) “Verily,
I am the servant of Bahá’, the slave of Bahá’, the captive of Bahá’. I have no
grade but to this and I do not possess anything for myself.” (p. 603.)
A power from on high animates Him: the Holy Spirit moves His limbs, His
pen. To suffer for God’s sake, to drink the cup of

*
‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Tablets of Abdul-Baha Abbas, vols I–III (1909, 1915 and 1916). Some new
translations are found in Selections from the Writings of ‘Abdu'l-Bahá.
78 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
sacrifice is His “utmost hope, the joy of my heart, the consolation of my soul and
my final desire.” (p. 715)
Again and again He rejects commiseration offered on account of His
calamities and afflictions. “These are not calamities, but bounties; they are not
afflictions, but gifts; not hardships, but tranquillity; not trouble, but mercy—and
we thank God for this great favour.” (p. 128.) He asserts His independence of all
His enemies can do to harm Him.
“I am free,” he writes, “although I should remain in prison. All fortresses and
castles cannot confine me, and the dungeon cannot bring me under the narrow
bondage of the world. The spirit is ever soaring, even if the body be in the
depths. … Therefore, neither the prison is a cause of sorrow, nor freedom from it
a source of joy.” (p. 151)
These letters fill hundreds of printed pages. Each correspondent is addressed
by some special spiritual title chosen by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá for him or for her,
personally, as, “O thou who art turning to the divine Kingdom”, “O thou candle
of the Love of God”, “O thou servant of God”, “O thou opened rose in the garden
of al-Abhá”, “O thou who art awakened to the Cause of God”, “O thou
worshipper of Truth”, “O thou servant of humanity”, “O thou who art yearning
for the Glad-tidings of God”.
He deals with diverse problems; answers countless questions about the past
and the present, about Revelation, about Christianity, about social life, the life of
the home, about marriage and children. He sets forth the cause of God and its
administration. He exposes the error and the evil of the times. He comforts,
counsels, commands, urges; He chants praises of God and of His faithful ones.
Whatever the subject, whatever the occasion, whatever the need, the same divine
might of His creative love calls into action the awakening spirit of the people of
the West. His heart, He writes (p. 6o), overflows with gladness and exultation as
He reads the letters of the beloved of God whose eyes are enlightened by God,
whose hearts and consciences are purified by knowledge and love of God and
who have found peace of soul through the commemoration of God.
He remembers them at all times, prays for them every morn
The letters of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá 79
and eve. (p. 113) “Do not think that ye are forgotten for one moment!” (p. 593).
“Trust thou in the love of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, for verily, nothing equals it.” (p. 201.)
If for any reason letters do not reach Him He misses them and life and
conscience do not find happiness and joy. (p. 375) Yet important and dearly
cherished as letters are He is in close and living touch with the faithful in spite of
distance, in spite of interruption in correspondence. Time and place do not
control the Spirit nor the inwardness of spiritual realities: geographical
remoteness from a heavenly centre will not obscure the vision of its glory.
“When the Spirit is breathed in the East, its signs immediately appear in the West
and it hath a spiritual dominion which penetrates the pillars of the world.” (p.
289) If the friends be firm in the cause of God and in His service, spiritual letters
come down to them from the Kingdom of ‘Abhá. Their descent is according to
an eternal law; their movement is like that of wave following wave and they bear
tidings of the unity of God. The love of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá for His faithful friends is
itself another and a special messenger between them. If a human heart be truly
sensitive to the call of God, then there is stretched between its centre and the
centre of the Kingdom a connection through which the spirit sends its messages.
Every faithful loving heart is endued with this means of communion. (pp. 287,
628)
‘Abdu’l-Bahá is spiritually present with the faithful at their meetings and is
their protector, “who spreads His wings (over) above them.” (p. 9o)
In phrase after phrase, passage after passage challenging, vigorous, profound,
He tells of the transcendent unimagined imperishable splendour of the ‘Abhá
Kingdom they are entering. (p. 289)
“O maidservant of God! Every star hath a setting, but the star of knowledge
of God in the divine heaven; every light shall darken save the light of the
guidance of God; every dignity shall vanish away save the glory under the
shadow of the Word of God.” (p. 129) He calls on the beloved (pp. 411–2) to
seize the opportunity God’s mercy offers them—“Truly I say unto you, this is a
gift which neither the dominion of the world, nor the riches of treasuries,
80 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
nor the glory of the distinguished men of the world, can equal in this glorious
century and new age; inasmuch as crowns are transient, while this is eternal and
never ending.”
“In the world of existence nothing hath any result, even if it be dominion over
the East and West. But that which hath an immortal result is servitude in the
Holy Threshold, service rendered to the Kingdom of God and guiding all in the
earth.” (p. 424) “O beloved of God! Know ye that the world is like unto a
mirage which the thirsty one thinks to be water; its water is a vapor; its mercy a
difficulty; its repose hardship and ordeal; leave it to its people and turn unto the
Kingdom of your Lord the Merciful.” (p. 407)
He pours His blessing upon them. “Blessed ye are, O ye stars who are
beaming with the light of the love of God! Blessed ye are, O ye lamps lighted
with the fire of the love of God! Blessed ye are, O ye who are attracted to the
Kingdom of God! Glad-tidings be unto you, O you who are severed from aught
else save God! … Glad-tidings be unto you through the gift of the Covenant …!
Be rejoiced …; be gladdened …; dilate your breasts …, and console your eyes by
witnessing the bounties of the Supreme Concourse.” (p. 30)
“The cup of knowledge is overflowing; blessed are they who partake in
draughts! … The gates of Heaven are open; blessed are they who see! The hosts
of angels are standing in battle order; what a joy to those who gain the victory!
The trumpet of life is sounding; how good it is to those who are awake!” (p. 620)
He calls on them again and again to realise the supreme privilege which is
vouchsafed them by the mercy of God, and to pour forth every kind of praise to
Him for ever from grateful, happy, radiant hearts. (pp. 182, 259, 413, 594, etc.)
There is a note of warning, too: “The time is short, and the Divine Courser
moves swiftly on ….” (p. 406) To those who complain the path to the Kingdom is
hard, obstacles many, difficulties severe; who are perplexed, burdened,
discouraged, He says such trials are to be expected. Earthly aims are not won
without effort and perseverance, and obstacles to these great spiritual attainments
naturally are greater still.
Through steadfastness in overcoming these trials, the soul of the believer is
brought nearer to God and at last reaches the condition of knowledge and
assurance. As Nature, having borne with
The letters of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá 81
patience the lightning and thunderbolts and storms of winters, is afterwards
rewarded with the season of blossoms, flowers and fruits; so in the Kingdom of
heaven the storms of trials give a constant heart the means of earning the good
pleasure of God and the prizes of the Kingdom.
How extreme in times long past were the troubles of the lovers of Christ. Yet
their courage was proof, and their reward was eternal life and everlasting Glory.
If tests are severe, it is that they may expose the weakness of those who are
unworthy, and enable every true hearted soul to “shine forth from the horizon of
the Most Great Guidance ….” (p. 470) To any such soul tests, however violent,
are a gift from God, the Exalted, and He hastens towards them with joy and
gladness, for they will cleanse him of those imperfections that keep him removed
from his Beloved. (p. 722)
‘Abdu’l-Bahá bids the faithful not to be grieved at the divine trials: but to
turn to God, to bow before His will in lowliness, to pray to Him, to be content
under all conditions, to be thankful to Him in the midst of affliction.
They are to know that in this age the greatest of all titles, the highest of all
praise is given for resolution and firmness because the tests and trials are of the
greatest intensity.
The mastery of life and its trials belongs only to believers and comes only
from turning to God. When asked about problems of human relationships or the
life of the home He affirms that one must at all times be free from merely
personal desires and warmed with devotion to God. One must love all people
and one’s own family with a ray of the infinite Godward love—personal love is
not enough.
To one whose home was a place of strain He wrote: “It behooveth thee to
sever thyself from all desires save thy Lord, the Supreme, expecting no help or
aid from anyone in the universe, not even from thy father or children. Resign
thyself to God! … Be patient …, endure every difficulty and hardship with a
dilated heart, attracted spirit and eloquent tongue in remembrance of the
Merciful.” (pp. 97–8) To another He wrote explaining: “When thou beholdest
with the eye of Truth then thou wilt realize that in this
82 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
world neither known or unknown, neither kind father or beloved son, mother or
sister, help us. No persons assist except the Benevolent Almighty.
“When thou knowest Him, thou art independent from all else. When thou art
attached to His love, then thou art detached from every kith and kin.” (p. 671)
Only when the heart has broken the lure of a limited love can it be attuned to the
perfect love, the perfect joy that will satisfy it for ever.
“Know that in every home when God is praised and prayed to, and His
Kingdom proclaimed, that home is a garden of God and a paradise of His
happiness.” (p. 69)
He writes of the importance of marriage and of its responsibilities (e.g., pp.
609, 627) and shows (p. 605) that true marriage is accessible only to the
spiritually minded, and that the real bond between husband and wife is none other
than the Word of God.
He suggests that the naming of a child should be made a religious and social
occasion: that friends should be invited to the home and that before the name is
given suitable prayers should be said; after which the company should enjoy
some light repast together. He calls for obedience and kindness from children to
their parents (p. 551); and on the other hand, in the strongest manner, stresses the
obligation laid by God in this Dispensation on parents to bring up their children
in the knowledge and fear of God. “Should they neglect this matter, they shall,
be held responsible and worthy of reproach in the presence of the stern Lord.
This is a sin unpardonable ….” (p. 579)
For those who seek comfort in the anguish of a fresh bereavement He lifts a
little the veil that hides from them that eternal world in which love knows no
separation. He bids them remember this parting is limited to the body, its length
will be counted in days and over the Spirit death has no dominion at all. Reunion
and everlasting consolation are near. “… know that thy pure son shall be with
thee in the Kingdom of God and thou shalt witness his smiling face, illumined
brow, handsome spirit and real happiness. Accordingly, thou wilt then be
comforted and thank God for His favor upon thee.” (p. 86)
To the faithful or as he names them “the people of adoration,” He writes
“death is an ark of deliverance ….” (p. 444) Could these
The letters of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá 83
mourners but see in heaven now the faithful souls they lament, wonder and joy
would check their tears. He comforts a mourning mother (p. 405) “O Bird of the
Rose-Garden of Fidelity! Be of no cheerless heart; have no wing nor feather
broken; sigh not, neither do thou wail nor sit chilled in a corner. The little girl
lamented is in the divine Rose-Garden in the highest happiness, delight,
cheerfulness and gratification. Why then art thou grieved, sorrowing with a
bleeding heart? This is the day of rejoicing and the hour of ecstasy! This is the
season of the dead arising from the graves and gathering together! And this is
the promised time for the attainment of plenteous grace.
“Be calm, be strong, be grateful, and become a lamp full of light, that the
darkness of sorrows be annihilated, and that the sun of everlasting joy arise from
the dawning-place of heart and soul, shining brightly.
“Upon thee be the Glory of the Most-Glorious!” (p. 405)
To a physician seeking counsel, He writes: “Whenever thou presentest thyself
at the bed of a patient turn thy face towards the Lord of the Kingdom and
supplicate assistance from the Holy Spirit and heal the ailments of the sick one.”
(p. 688)
Answering an enquiry about the nature of the sympathetic nervous system He
explains that the powers of the sympathetic nerve are not exclusively spiritual nor
exclusively physical, but are between the two and connected with both. The
operation of the nerve is normal when its relations with the spiritual and the
physical systems are perfect. “When the material and the divine world are
rightly co-related, when the hearts become heavenly and the aspirations grow
pure and divine, perfect connection shall take place. Then shall this power
produce a perfect manifestation. Physical and spiritual diseases will then receive
absolute healing.
“The exposition is brief. Ponder and thou shalt understand the meaning.” (p.
309)
All life in reality opens on heaven, and all experience lies in the path of God.
To those who consult Him about the study and practice of letters, music, painting,
science and the like, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá explains that these pursuits are one and all to
*
be inspired by the sense of worship. “Art is worship,” as He once said. He
affirms that a spiritual motive in the artist will quicken his progress and heighten
his proficiency. A believer will find his art a natural

*
‘Abdu’l-Bahá in London, p. 93.
84 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
medium of communicating the Divine Message; if his work has itself a spiritual
quality it will awaken the spiritual susceptibilities of the beholder while his social
intercourse with fellow-artists will tend to guide their thoughts to appreciation of
the Divine Beauty. (pp. 449–50)
At the present time all divine power poured from heaven on humanity has its
focus in Bahá’u’lláh, and reaches mankind through His mediation alone. As in
our solar system the source of all physical light is the sun, and every light directly
or indirectly is derived from it, so in the spiritual realm every Age has its Messiah
and truth is attained by men only through Him. (p. 595) “Whatever question thou
hast in thy heart,” writes ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, “turn thou thy heart toward the kingdom
of Abhá and entreat at the Threshold of the Almighty and reflect upon that
problem, then unquestionably the light of truth shall dawn and the reality of that
problem will become evident and clear to thee. For the teachings of His
Highness Bahá’u’lláh are the keys to all the doors.” (p. 692)
In the past, He points out, there were great philosophers who upheld the ideal
of the oneness of humanity; but at that time the support and inspiration of heaven
were not forthcoming so that their endeavours bore no fruit. To-day there are
many souls in the world who spread thoughts of peace and reconciliation and
long to establish the unity of the human race. But they likewise are without the
dynamic power to carry their ideal into effect. This power belongs only to the
instructions and exhortations of Bahá’u’lláh whose summons to world-unity is
supported by the word of God and by all the resources of the Kingdom of the
Most High. “Therefore, O thou lover of the oneness of the world of humanity!
spread thou as much as thou canst the instructions and teachings of His Highness
Bahá’u’lláh ….” (p. 691)
There is indeed need of a thousand teachers, He writes, each one severed from
the world, attracted by the Holy Spirit, radiant with the joy of the Kingdom,
seeking no reward or recompense. “… strive with life and heart and guide the
people to the Kingdom of God, lead them to the straight pathway, inform them of
the greatness and magnitude of this Cause and give them the glad-tidings ….” (p.
360)
The letters of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá 85
The world of humanity to-day is like a sick and feeble man; the teachers are
wise physicians. The remedies which they are to apply are two. The first to be
given is that of guidance, that the people “may turn unto God, hearken unto the
divine commandments and go forth with hearing ear and seeing eye.” (p. 36)
When this remedy has had its effect, then the people are “to be trained in the
conduct, morals and deeds of the Supreme Concourse, encouraged and inspired
with the gifts of the Kingdom of Abhá.” (pp. 36–7) Their hearts are to be cleansed
of all ill-will and to be strengthened in all the attributes of love and union so that
East and West may be joined in one, and universal peace be established. In the
pursuit of their task, teachers are not to spare themselves nor to seek rest. They
are to make the utmost endeavour to bring the Glad Tidings to the ears of
mankind and are to accept every calamity and affliction in their love for God and
their reliance on ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. (p. 38) They are to drink from the eternal chalice
of the love of God, to enjoy its ecstasy and in the radiance of the beauty of ‘Abhá
be all aglow with zeal, delight and eager energy. They all are to work together in
perfect unanimity and singleness of purpose. “… ye must in perfect purity attain
spiritual unity and agreement to a degree that ye may express one spirit and one
life.” (p. 23)
It was to this end, to unite the hearts of the beloved of God, that Bahá’u’lláh
endured all difficulties and all ordeals (p. 247); and the aim of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s
devotion and service is the same; “that union and affection may be created
among the beloved of God, nay, in the whole of the human world.” (p. 421)
Nothing can exceed the emphasis and earnestness with which in these Tablets
he appeals for concord and unity among believers. This is the vital instrument
through which is to be achieved the master-objective of the Bahá’í Movement,
namely the transforming of the earth into a paradise, the wide world into one
home, the nations of East and West into one household. “Not until this (union) is
realized will the affairs advance by any means whatever!” (p. 125) Therefore,
even in those early days of the Faith when believers were very few in the West,
He begins the work of organisation, urges co-operation and gatherings among the
friends, the forming of committees for promoting the Cause and of what were at
that
86 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
time called Boards of Consultation. “… the greatest means for the union and
harmony of all is Spiritual Meetings. This matter is very important ….” (p. 125)
Such meetings will be magnets drawing down divine strength.
“Blessed are ye,” He writes to one group, “for organizing the assembly of
unity!” (p. 272) As these meetings begin to materialise, He insists that the
highest degree of union and harmony must exist between them. The spiritual
meeting of consultation in New York must be in the fullest accord with that in
Chicago, and when a similar meeting “may be also organized in Washington…,
these two meetings (of Chicago and New York) must be also in unity and
harmony with that meeting.” (p. 124)
He watches over the constitution of these bodies, instructs that each shall have
its clearly marked purpose and fit into the general scheme as an integral part of
the whole, and that no spirit of exclusiveness shall be aroused such as has
happened in earlier Dispensations when arrangements which “were, in the
beginning, a means for harmony, they became in the end a cause of trouble.” (p.
394)
He institutes, too, the great observance of the Faith, the yearly fast from
March 2nd–20th; “the nineteen-day fast is a duty to be observed by all” (p. 57)—
and the “Feast of Remembrance or Meeting of Faithfulness” as it was then called.
(fn, p. 421)
“This Feast,” He writes, “was established by His Highness the Báb, to occur
once in nineteen days. Likewise the Blessed Perfection hath commanded,
encouraged and reiterated it. Therefore, it hath the utmost importance.
Undoubtedly you must give the greatest attention to its establishment and raise it
to the highest point of importance, so that it may become continual and
constant.” (p. 468)
He then gives directions as to the keeping of the Feast; and concludes—“If the
Feast is arranged in this manner and in the way mentioned, that supper is the
‘Lord’s supper’, for the result is the same result and the effect is the same effect.”
(p. 469)
These Tablets, published in America and written chiefly to American
believers, form a sister—and complementary—volume to that which contains
‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s American addresses and bears the title The Promulgation of
Universal Peace. Taken
The letters of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá 87
together they form, as it were, a complete circle of Divine and practical
instruction for the times.
The Addresses constitute the profoundest and most comprehensive textbook
on modern problems. They reveal what true modernism is, dealing with the
larger aspects of the Cause of Bahá’u’lláh, with questions of the relations and the
history of religions and of peoples, with science and philosophy, with the
principles of world order and with definite plans for its establishment. The
Tablets, on the other hand, are directed for the most part to individuals, often to
individuals who look to Him with ardent belief and adoring love. They reveal
clearly and emphatically the essential nature of His own special station as the
bondservant of Bahá’u’lláh and the Centre of the Covenant. They are heart to
heart talks on the personal hopes and aspirations of His correspondents, their
personal trials and difficulties, their personal duties and obligations to God and
His Faith. The writer’s attitude is that of a host greeting an honoured and loved
guest, a father welcoming a dear son home from a long and perilous journey: it is
that of a divine messenger who brings to those struggling in the uncertain turmoil
of earthly life a foretaste of the sweetness and fragrance and harmony and peace
of Paradise and of the eternal glory and power that will be the reward of victory.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá stated that these Tablets have an importance which will not be
appreciated for many long years to come. But perhaps their message of the
impassioned all-embracing love of God will never be more sadly needed than it is
now, nor more precious than it is to us as we battle on through the heart of the
storm and the darkness and the ruin of the Night of Judgment and Retribution.
The wellspring of happiness
Part I
HAPPINESS IS OUR birthright: it is ours to take, to hold, to possess in
perpetuity. If it seem hidden from us it is not hidden by distance but by nearness.
We do not have to go questing for it through the wide earth nor through the
immensity of the heavens. It is in our midst. It is closer to us than breathing. It
is buried in our own heart’s-deep, deep in the heart’s inmost recesses; and there it
dwells waiting to be recognised, to be discovered.
Everyone can be happy and ought to be. God expects it and enjoins it. Every
Revelation comes as Glad Tidings, bidding man be glad and giving him cause to
be. Every Prophet has found men wandering in sadness and misery and has
rebuked them for it. He has called them away from the things that produce
unhappiness, from anxiety and worry and cupidity, from fear of the future, from
anticipation of evil, from lack of hope and faith. He has opened to them a way of
escape, promised them deliverance from evil, and the attainment, by God’s grace,
of a happiness that will satisfy and endure. Now in our time the Prophet of the
New Age into which we are entering, Bahá’u’lláh, gives once again the ancient
glad tidings—tidings of a happiness poured forth from heaven on all men
everywhere in even greater abundance, yes, in far, far greater abundance than
ever in the history of the past—a happiness the bright and eager intensity of
which can only be measured, if at all, by the bitterness of our need and by the
extremity of our humiliation and our suffering. Exultation and victory ring in
every sentence of His proclamation of the All-Glorious Advent of God. The
ancient promise, He cries, is fulfilled.
God’s mercy and generosity have overcome at last the apathy and dullness of
His creatures. His Name has conquered the earth. He has exposed to man’s
knowledge the futility and the stupidity

The wellspring of happiness 89
of strife. The long power of delusion is broken. The reign of violence and
misery is doomed. The time has come for man to attain a new understanding,
new ideals, a new life which will deliver him permanently from the glooms and
superstitions of ignorance and will make possible that serene divine happiness
which he was created to enjoy. The earth (throughout its entire length and
breadth) ought now to be filled with songs of praise and thanksgiving; and the
only reason it is not so is that the opacity of man’s pride has shut out from his
knowledge the light of the joy of heaven that is beating upon him.
‘Abdul-Bahá taught that one of the nine marks by which the True Messenger
of God was to be identified was His being “a joy-bringer and the herald of the
kingdom of happiness ….” Bahá’u’lláh in the midst of dire afflictions showed
forth a spirit of serenity and acceptance radiating in others that deep steadfast joy
that filled His own heart. He taught men to think of God as a God of Bliss—as
one “by whose name the sea of joy moveth and the fragrance of happiness is
wafted!” He bade men if they wished for happiness to pray for it to God.
“I ask Thee to show me, from the wonders of Thy Favor, that which shall
brighten my eyes and gladden my heart.” “From the fragrant breezes of Thy joy
§
let a breath pass over me ….”
He bade men receive His message as a summons to happiness. “O son of
Spirit! With the joyful tidings of light I hail thee: rejoice! … The spirit of
holiness beareth unto thee joyful tidings of reunion; wherefore dost thou grieve?
… O son of man! Rejoice in the gladness of thine heart, that thou mayest be
worthy to meet Me and to mirror forth My beauty.”
‘Abdul-Bahá brought to the world the message of the New Revelation as Glad
Tidings. “If,” He would say, “we are not happy and joyous at this season, for
”5
what other season shall we wait and for what other time shall we look? A man
ought to be happy because if he were not he could not be in the frame of mind to
receive the bounties poured forth from on high.
When He gave a direction to the English Bahá’ís for the keeping of the day of
the Báb, “the day of the dawning of the Morning of Guidance”, His words were:
“Be happy! Be happy! Be full of

‘Abdu’l-Bahá in Star of the West, VI:15, 12 December 1915, p. 117.
Bahá’u’lláh in Bahá’í Scriptures, no, 270, p. 186.
ibid.
§
Bahá’u’lláh, Prayers and Meditations, p. 258.
The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, Nos 33, 34 & 36.
Tablets of Abdul-Baha Abbas, vol. 3, p. 641.
90 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
joy!” On another occasion, He said, “The people must be so attracted to you
that they will exclaim, ‘What happiness exists among you!’ and will see in your
faces the lights of the Kingdom; then in wonderment they will turn to you and
seek the cause of your happiness.”
When asked to describe how true believers ought to live, His first direction
was that they should cause no one any unhappiness; and He closed His adjuration
with a kindred thought—“Be a cause of healing for every sick one, a comforter
for every sorrowful one, a pleasant water for every thirsty one, a star to every
horizon, a light for every lamp, a herald to every one who yearns for the
Kingdom of God.”
In the days of persecution in Persia, so great a spirit of happiness pervaded the
Bahá’ís that it was said one could not take tea with them without wishing to join
their society; and so strong was their personal influence that their enemies
believed them to be possessed of some unholy magic by which they won the
hearts of men to believe in the new doctrine. We have for so long sought
happiness by secular or even pagan ways that although these are leading us to a
dead end, we find it hard to admit that we have been travelling altogether in the
wrong direction. Religion (for all the honours we instinctively pay it) has in the
hands of traditionalists and formalists proved itself so impotent, a cause of so
much division and discord, that when once again for the first time in hundreds
and hundreds of years a Divine Prophet stands in our midst and in the name of
God offers deliverance and peace of heart and blessedness we can hardly believe
our eyes or our ears.
We refuse to recognise that a clue to the most precious of all lost secrets has
been put into our hands and that the mystery of a perfect love has been opened to
us. The very lavishness and immensity of the gift bewilders us, almost stupefies
us; as though a beggar had asked a crust and was given a kingdom. The
timeliness of the gift still further enhances its value and magnifies our
astonishment.
Religion has become more and more discredited. Its results have not seemed
at all worth its disciplines. Its views on life have grown antiquated and do not fit
nor illumine modern conditions

‘Abdu’l-Bahá in London, p. 127.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá, The Promulgation of Universal Peace, p. 218.
The wellspring of happiness 91
of society. Those who appeared as the protagonists of religion have not stood out
as models of happiness or broad sympathies: they have not been able to give
men any clear guidance in the moral mazes of modem existence nor to impart
comfort or strength in the frustrations that beset our efforts at stablising the social
order.
Men have found many excuses for letting their faith grow cold and their
religious sense become atrophied by disuse. Ordinary everyday human life has
become so varied, so rich, so full of change and of movement and of novelty that
it seems to be quite full and satisfying in itself and to stand in no need of religion.
Men find full employment and room for intense and engrossing activities in
purely secular and mundane interests. Never have they acquired so much to
gratify their pride; never have they been so equipped to refine and elaborate their
pleasures. They sought happiness altogether in the material things that lay to
their hand.
And to a large extent—they found it!
God is kind and generous. He has made it easier for man to be happy than to
be unhappy. He has scattered some kind or other of pleasantness for us
everywhere. No one can miss it all! Songs of celestial delight, fragrances from
the Gardens of Paradise, rays of some beatific Beauty are borne to earth on all the
winds of heaven and cause some echo, however brief, some reflection, dim or
faint; or find some home in the hearts of men wherein to rest. We sharpened our
intellects, cast away our superstitions and obscurations of the past, unearthed the
secrets of nature, appropriated her powers and extended our control over the
world about us in a manner in which our ancestors, even a century ago, would
never have imagined to be possible. Never had so complex and so forceful a
civilisation been reared upon the face of the earth. And if we were compelled to
feel there was something incomplete and insecure about it all; if we realised the
tiger and the ape in us had not been outgrown, and if we saw that in spite of
ourselves we were sinking back to the primitive ways of the jungle; nevertheless,
no earlier generation of men had found so much in the world to amuse and divert
and flatter and gratify them, or to
92 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
prove so clearly their supremacy over all the lower forms of creation. If all
civilised beings were not supermen they were assuredly superanimals and had at
command a thousand kinds of intellectual entertainment which were peculiarly
human and their own. Men explored the resources of humanism and bathed their
souls and their sense in its delights. Intellectuals discounted that part of our
tradition which is derived from Israel and emphasised more and more that which
has come down to us from Greece. They turned, not their hearts only, but their
minds, too, from their religious inheritance to an inheritance that was definitely
not religious but artistic and literary. The Greeks carved statues of their gods
which remain to this day models of taste and skill and are the envy and
admiration of the world: but these gods were assuredly not made to be
worshipped. The Greeks reared the Parthenon and countless temples, which are
in their kind masterpieces as perfect as their works of sculpture. But these
temples do not suggest the unseen world; they do not carry with them an air of
mystery, of awe, of exultation. Contrast them with a Christian cathedral—with
that sense of distance, with that sublimity and aspiration which the soaring lines
of Gothic awake in the spectator’s soul—and the limitation of the Greek architect
at once is betrayed. A Greek temple with its flat lines is of the earth, earthy: “A
table on four legs: a dull thing!”, as William Morris is said to have exclaimed of
the Parthenon: and he was no belittler of the beauty of the past.
No one would disparage the glory that was Greece nor yet the splendour that
was Rome. All the encomiums passed upon them recently by scholars are no
doubt as just as they are enthusiastic. But the most significant thing about the
revival of Greek influence is that its champions attribute that revival to the fact
that the Greek world was non-religious and purely humanistic and that its affinity
which connects our age with theirs lies in the common limitations of both. In
neither does the spiritual seek to find expression. Revelation was unknown to the
Greeks and is unacceptable to the modern: hence they say in our outlook on life
we are akin.
One of the greatest authorities on Greek humanism, Professor
The wellspring of happiness 93
R. W. Livingstone, a brilliant and charming writer, puts the point quite clearly in
his book Greek Genius and Its Meaning to Us (p. 247). “Let us sum up,” he says,
“the reasons of our approximation to Greece. First is Greek humanism … The
Greek set himself to answer the question how with no revelation from God to
guide him … man should live. It has been a tendency in our own age either to
deny that heaven has revealed to us in any way how we ought to behave or to
find such a revelation in human nature itself. In either case we are thrown back
on ourselves and obliged to seek our guide there. That is why the influence of
Greece has grown so much. The Greeks are the only people who have conceived
the problem similarly; their answer the only one that has yet been made.”
That is very clear. But who will affirm that the masterpieces inspired by the
Christian religion are less splendid than those of Greek humanism? Who will
deny that Christian literature and art, in all its branches, the work of men as
various as Michael Angelo and Milton, and Dante and da Vinci, has a beauty and
a power and a richness and a majesty even superior to that of Greeks—and to
what is this due but manifestly and confessedly to a spiritual revelation?
Whatever masterpieces of humanistic art and craftsmanship the Greeks may
have left us, did they bequeath to posterity any secret of happiness—of a
happiness that really satisfies, leaving no hunger, a happiness that endures
producing no satiety and not ending at the last in something that is not happiness?
And those academicians who drank deeply of the fountain of Greek wisdom,
have they been able to save us from this self-stultification of intellectualism?
Is there to be found in Greek literature or art anything comparable to that
high, noble, courageous, invincible joy that vibrates in a book which formally is
by no means a Greeklike masterpiece of artistic skill or genius—the New
Testament?
It was the Greeks who handed down to us the story of the Skeleton at the
Feast and told how before the banquet closed a servant would bring a skeleton
and bid the guests “eat, drink and be merry for to-morrow you die.” It was the
Greeks who said no
94 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
man should be called happy till his death, and they certainly did not promise him
much happiness beyond it. Not to live long, they thought, was best; those whom
the gods loved died young. The most wonderful and famous of their literary
works gave no message of glory and hope and triumph, but were tragedies,
written frequently around themes of a sombre, terrifying and even gruesome cast.
Scholars have remarked that an undertone of sadness seemed to run through
the great literature of Greece. The reason is that it is humanistic—and nothing
more. For when humanism thinks deeply, it thinks sadly. Our English
Renaissance was not so secular as was the culture of ancient Greece: far from it.
England was a Christian country with a Christian tradition and the Authorised
Version was produced at the same time as The Tempest and The Winter’s Tale.
But the accent of its Renaissance was on the human not the spiritual side, and
Shakespeare in this was a true exponent of it. Broad as his sympathies were, if
there be any character he could not have understood nor have put sympathetically
into a drama, it is such a one as Shelley. You will find many notes in
Shakespeare’s singing; but not the note of the poetry of Blake. Shakespeare’s
world was far from being as Revelationless as that of ancient Greece; but the
mystical aspect of things is not brought into his picture.
He, too, when he thought deeply, thought sadly. His greatest works are not
his comedies, brilliant as these are. Even in these there is a shadow: not only in
The Merchant of Venice but even in the gayest of all, Twelfth Night and As You
Like It, and still more in The Tempest. (Poor Prospero: at the end he must bury
his art—not carry it on to happier fulfilment!) But his greatest works were his
tragedies and his fame rests on them.
How mighty and vigorous, how confident, adventurous, and triumphant was
the England of those days, the England of Queen Elizabeth! Yet that eager and
self-sufficient age did not through its most eloquent spokesmen speak the fullest
happiness. Could any illustration show more conclusively the inadequacy of
humanism to meet the needs of humanity?
However gay, delightful, praiseworthy, the happiness that
The wellspring of happiness 95
humanism fathers, it must in the nature of things be qualified. It cannot be
complete. Humanism can only bid us make the best of things—to look on the
bright side and take the rough with the smooth. But sorrow and suffering cannot
be ignored or evaded. They will insistently intrude themselves. It is not the stoic
who has overcome the world and is able to bequeath his joy to others when he is
gone. No, sorrow and suffering must be faced and included within the scheme of
happiness: there is no device by which they can be left on the outside of life and
induced to remain there! And if this alternation of shadow and light, this
chequered and inconstant happiness be the best that life can give; if our wellbeing be the sport of circumstance and the plaything of fate, then, indeed, one can
hardly escape from pessimism. The birds of the air who neither have to sow nor
reap are happier than we!
It is religion which teaches us that pessimism is utterly wrong; that pessimism
is the product of a circumscribed and limited experience. It is religion which for
the first time opens up to man’s vision the height and depth, the range and the
reality of God’s munificence to His creatures.
God has created man other sources of pleasure and happiness which lie
beyond those of reason and the senses; He has created solaces, delights, raptures
which arise out of the activity of higher powers, higher faculties, and belong to
man’s moral nature, to the inmost and most real sphere of his being. The sphere
of conscience, of the sense of right and wrong, of spiritual perception, has been
affirmed by God and is felt instinctively by man to be of greater value and
dignity, to be farther from earth and nearer to heaven, than the realm of
sensibility or ratiocination; and the content, the tranquility, the happiness, the
ecstasy that attach to it (like, too, its pains) are more deeply set and more vital
than those which derive from the lower ranges of man’s consciousness. The
common everyday experience of every mortal being bears witness to this truth;
and the long, glorious story of those who in every age have laboured to advance
civilisation, to promote moral progress, to establish the practice of true religion,
is rich in proofs of it.
96 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
Part II
Of a surety God is Joy! This is the creed, the experience, the message of
religion. Not only high poets through their intuition, but the seers, the saints, the
prophets, one and all, have recognised this all-explanatory, this all-animating
truth. The hopes and dreams of suffering, longing mankind have been as a mirror
reflecting a great reality. There is—there is a Being whose name is Bliss—
changeless, throned above vicissitude and all shadow, without beginning or
ending, the Eternal One, the Master of all Life, radiant, beautiful, beloved!
Had they not known this Being, the Founders of the Religions could never
have thought or spoken or endeavoured as they did: they would have had no
message of comfort to give to sorrowing mankind and they could not have
promised that all tears would be wiped away and only happiness would remain.
Christ Himself possessed inalienably this joy; and the immortal prospect which
He held before those who died in the faith was that of sharing in eternity the joy
of God. One of His express gifts to His disciples on earth was joy. “These things
I have spoken unto you that my joy may be within you and your joy complete.”
He said that the joy of the true believer was so great that for joy he would sell all
he had to gain the object of his love! And He assured His disciples that nothing
would ever take this joy away from them. The disciples are described as being
filled with joy and the Holy Spirit. Paul described the Kingdom of God as “joy
in the Holy Ghost”, and bade those to whom he wrote to “Rejoice in the Lord”,
and “evermore to give thanks”. The New Testament, not only in the Gospels, but
from the Acts to the Apocalypse, is alive with the spirit of a pervading and
inviolable joy.
Not in the New Testament only but in the higher reaches of the Old
Testament the same song of happiness is heard: “Rejoice in the Lord, O ye
righteous: for praise is comely for the righteous.” “I will greatly rejoice in the
Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God.”
The wellspring of happiness 97
Had not the early Christians been animated with an invincible confidence and
an amazing power of attraction, they could never have overcome indifference and
persecution and won the hearts of the world to submission to Christ.
One striking proof of this spirit meets one in the early works of Christian art.
This art was largely a sepulchral art, found in the catacombs or associated with
death and often with martyrdom; and it was produced in time of tribulation and
struggle. Yet images of sorrow and suffering are systematically excluded from it,
nor is there in it any expression of bitterness or complaint. Pictures such as that
of Daniel unharmed among the lions or the three children unscathed amid the
flames, are the sole indication of the dreadful persecutions raging at the time.
There are few representations of martyrdom, and none (as it seems) till a late
date. Instead, one finds emblems of beauty and happiness—pictures of the
miracles of mercy, sweet emblems of immortality, and even joyous images
borrowed from the mythology of the pagans.
Centuries passed away before this brave and tender note ceased to be
dominant in Christian art and another and very different mood took its place.
In distant India, long before the time of Christ, the Gita had borne witness to
their Eternal Joy and had opened to men the way to realise it.
“For persons free from desire or hatred, for the persons who have controlled
their mind and who have realised the Self everywhere is found the bliss of
Brahman.”
And again, “To persons who have known the Self, the bliss of Brahman lies
everywhere.”
Buddha uttered statements similar to those of Christ on His possession and
His gift of happiness. He said of Himself that He “lived in the pure land of
eternal bliss even while he was still in the body and he preached the laws of
religion to you and the whole world that you and your brethren may attain the
same peace and the same happiness.”
He set forth five meditations through the use of which the devotee might
reach the land of bliss, the first of love, the second
98 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
of pity, “the third of joy in which you think of the prosperity of others and rejoice
with their rejoicings.”
Buddha taught insistently that misery and fear were caused by error, and that
knowledge of truth conferred a complete and undying joy even here on earth.
“There is misery in the world of birth and death: there is much misery and
pain. But greater than all the misery is the bliss of truth …. Blessed is he who
has become an embodiment of truth and loving kindness. He conquers though he
may be wounded; he is glorious and happy, although he may suffer ….”
“This is the sign that a man follows the right path: Uprightness is his delight
and he sees danger in the least of the things which he should avoid. He trains
himself in the commands of morality, he encompasseth himself with holiness in
word and deed … mindful and self-possessed, he is altogether happy.” And
again: “A brother who with firm determination walks in the noble path is sure to
come forth in the light, sure to reach up to the higher wisdom, sure to attain to
the highest bliss of enlightenment.”
But all the Founders of Religion have taught that the way to truth and the joy
of truth is narrow and difficult. The Divine Being who is the Soul of Bliss is hard
to find, hard to attain to. Objects of earthly ambition are not gained without
perseverance and labour: how much more effort will then be needed to achieve
this blissful union which is the most precious and the final goal of all human
endeavour! This divine joy is closely hidden, jealously concealed from the
casual observation of man—but it is not hidden by distance. On the contrary, it
lies close at hand and if it cannot be seen, this is because it is so very near. Not
only is it, as the poet said of God, “nearer to us than breathing, closer than hands
and feet” (that would be wonderful enough); but it is nearer to us than we are to
ourselves. There is in human nature always a possibility that a man’s superstition
or self-illusion will hang a veil between himself and his heart so that he will be in
blank ignorance of that which lies at the centre of his own being.
“Thus have their superstitions become veils between them and their own
*
hearts and kept them from the path of God, the Exalted, the Great.”

*
Bahá’u’lláh, Tablet of Aḥmad in Bahá’í Prayers, p. 210.
The wellspring of happiness 99
The psychological make-up of a man may be likened to a figure consisting of
three or four concentric circles, the outer representing his body and the senses,
the next representing the mental realm, the next the moral realm, and the
innermost circle standing for the realm of the spiritual which is the essential part
of man, the heart of his heart, and soul of his soul. It is possible for a man to live
and move and spend his whole existence in the outer fringes of his being, to shut
away from his experience the finer activities of thought and feeling and to have
his nobler and most vital faculties misused. He may occupy his time in this or
that pursuit yet never effect an entry into the sphere of conscience, of faith, or of
spirit.
Such men, said Christ, are dead. Though they walk about and work and wield
earthly influence, though they govern a province or preside at a Sanhedrin, they
are only rational animals, men in an embryonic stage, unfit to be dignified by the
title “man” in the fullness of its meaning. Such men cannot be happy. Their
minds are operating in a sphere where a stable and satisfying happiness is not to
be had. They are unconscious of that finer and inner realm of being in which
happiness is to be sought and found. Not to such men but to His disciples did
Jesus leave His peace and His joy.
This communion with God through which a man finds Bliss is a communion
of love, a meeting of like with like.
“I have breathed within thee a breath of my own Spirit, that thou mayest be
*
My lover.”
When the veils of illusion which hide a man’s own heart from himself are
drawn aside, when after purgation he comes to himself and attains selfknowledge and sees himself as he truly is, then at the same moment and by the
same act of knowledge he beholds there in his own heart His Father who has
patiently awaited His son’s return.
Only through this act of self-completion, through this conclusion of the
journey which begins in the kingdom of the senses and leads inward through the
kingdom of the moral to end in that of the spiritual, does real happiness become
possible. Now

*
The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, Arabic No. 19.
100 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
for the first time a man’s whole being can be integrated, and a harmony of all his
faculties be established. Through his union with the Divine Spirit he has found
the secret of the unifying of his own being. He who is the Breath of Joy becomes
the animating principle of his existence. Man knows the Peace of God.
This union with God is the only happiness which the Prophets one and all
affirm as worthy of the name. It does not belong to the accidents of life and is in
no degree the product of imagination or illusion. It is independent of all
contingencies. It rests on direct perception, on immediate union between the
creature and his Creator. It is shared with God in its essence and is therefore
imperishable and secure. The world did not give it and the world cannot take it
away. Afflictions may add to its strength and intensity, as winds will blow a
glowing fire to a flame; but they cannot violate it. It does not deny the other and
lesser pleasures which God in His generosity has bestowed upon His creatures. It
does not subsist on their mortification. It is compatible with them all. It does not
demand asceticism. The ministry of Jesus began with a marriage feast and His
enemies accused Him of being a gluttonous man and a wine-bibber. The Great
Ones of the Bahá’í Revelation lived, so far as conditions permitted, normal
human lives. As sons and brothers, as husbands and fathers, and friends and men
of business and affairs, they set examples which men may look to as they follow
the ordinary course of social life. Bahá’u’lláh expressly discouraged ascetic
habits: “Take what has been ordained for you,” He said. He permitted men by
definite injunction to enjoy the comforts and comelinesses and even the luxuries
of life so long as these did not wean their hearts from servitude to God and the
informing spirit of sacrifice. The ordinary pleasures of life, material and
intellectual, are to be taken as they come, neither being sought nor avoided but
left to fall into their appropriate places.
There is only one peace of mind, one joy, one happiness which in itself
deserves to be an object of contemplation and desire. The Great Prophets are not
content merely to bear witness to the reality of this, or to describe its nature.
They do more; they bear it into the world as a gift; they bring it within men’s
reach, urge

Bahá’u’lláh in Bahá’í World Faith, p. 435.
The wellspring of happiness 101
and encourage them to seek for it till they find it. The imperative which they lay
on men: “Rejoice and be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in heaven ….”
is not a mere counsel of perfection, not (God forbid) an unkind command to seek
a goal which men cannot attain (—will God mock His creatures?). It is a promise
of success. “Seek and ye shall find: knock and it shall be opened to you”; which
is as if He said, “You have only to strive and you will attain.”
“The heavens of thy mercy and the oceans of thy bounty are so vast that thou
hast never disappointed those who begged of thee nor refused those who willed to
*
come to thee!”
The poet does much when he testifies that God is Joy and when he, with
inspired vision, paints scenes of elysian beatitude that await the aspiring soul of
man. The High-Prophet does yet more. He opens not a vision, but the truth
itself. He brings the truth down into the world among men. He imparts to those
ready to receive it, the power to know the truth and become one with it.
Tragically every Prophet in religious history has found only a very few
persons ready to accept Him and faithfully to follow out His directions. Neither
in His life-time, nor in the life-time of the religion which He founds, though this
be centuries long, are there many disciples who will really put His
commandments to the test, will persevere in whole-hearted and exact obedience
and continue in spite of discouragements in the way He has marked out till they
reach the goal. Spiritual lassitude, moral compromise, the substitution of the
formal for the essential, have been the rule in the history of all religions. In
consequence the general effect of the teaching of the Prophets has only been a
fraction of what it might have been. The possibilities of religion, as affirmed by
those to whom the religions owe their origin, have never been developed. The
proportion of informed and determined followers to the total population was
never considerable enough to produce large historic results. There never have
been many who sought their happiness in the spiritual sphere and found that road
to inward bliss which their Prophet had trodden and had left open wide for them
to walk in. The efforts of men and nations, even too often of churches, have been
bent in other directions and

*
Bahá’u’lláh in Star of the West, VIII:4, 17 May 1917, p. 48.
102 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
their energies have been spent on less immaterial objects. In consequence,
human history all the world over has been darkened with troubles and
vicissitudes that need never have been, and has never been blessed with the hope,
the vision, the sense of proportion, or with anything better than the least
suggestion of the well being and happiness which the Prophet had brought within
human reach.
Not only the facts of history but the recorded forecasts of the Prophets in their
lifetime bear witness to this. Moses and Jesus both foresaw the failures and the
sufferings of their followers. No Scripture seems to show such premonitions of
future disasters and calamities or contains so many and such grave warnings of
faithlessness and of tribulation to come as the Gospel. But even in our own Age
Bahá’u’lláh Himself warned men of dire retribution at hand:
“O ye peoples of the world! Know verily, that an unforeseen calamity is
following you, and that grievous retribution awaiteth you. Think not the deeds ye
have committed have been blotted from My sight.” But if the great world never
yet has grasped or perceived its blessings and if the Prophets have foreseen and
foretold these ineptitudes and failures, the Prophets with one consent from the
first to the last, from the mythic times of Adam to the present ere have assured
mankind in no uncertain tones that this frustration and misery would not last
forever. The day would come when the religious and social conviction of
mankind would be changed, when the reality of spiritual happiness would be
appreciated, if not by the whole human race, at least by great and prevailing
multitudes and when it would become the possession not of a very, very few, but
of very many.
From the beginning, the date of this Event has been fixed by the providence
of the Creator. From the beginning, the certainty of its future advent has been
foretold to man in every Revelation. A symbolic reference to it is recorded in the
first chapter of the Bible, when the seventh or final day of creation is shown as
different from all the earlier days, as distinctively the Day of completeness and of
divine rest, the Day of God. Only one Prophet—among all the Prophets has not
foretold this future

Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 209–10.
The wellspring of happiness 103
Day of Fulfilment and Happiness: Bahá’u’lláh. His pronouncement is more
triumphant and happy, far more than that of any who preceded Him—for His
Glad Tidings is that the Promised Day of Happiness has come! God has come in
the plenitude of His power and the Lord of Bliss has established His kingdom on
earth. At last God’s love for His creatures has prevailed over man’s resistance.
God’s Name has conquered the earth. Man is to lift his eyes from mundane
levels and to look up towards heavenly places. His consciousness is to expand.
The fires of love are to be kindled in his heart and spiritual impulses are to stir
and move his soul. He is to become aware of the spiritual realms that have lain
unexplored in the recesses of his own heart and mind. He is to turn his eyes
within, upon himself, and to find God Himself standing there powerful, mighty,
supreme—the Lord of Joy.
To-day is the end of man’s long journey. The prodigal after his wanderings
and his humiliations has come to himself. He knows at last what he is; and
whence he came. He has returned to the Father who has left His own Home and
come to meet the beloved on the way. It is the Day of Reunion; the Day of God’s
fulfilment, the Day of Joy. And that Blissful Being with whom man is now
joined again, is found not to have absented Himself from man, not to have hidden
Himself, in the heights nor in the depths, but to have been at hand, radiant and
glorious in the recesses of man’s own spiritual being.
The genius of Ireland
ONCE, AND ONLY ONCE, and for One only has Ireland taken the part of a
leader among the peoples of Europe. Save for this one historical achievement,
she has stood outside the main currents of development in the West, and has
mingled little in European affairs. During the sixth, seventh and eighth centuries,
and later, she played an illustrious part in the propagation of Christianity in
Europe, and won for herself the undying title of the Island of Saints and Scholars.
From the distant Age until recent times, she has been overwhelmed by invaders
whom her rich lands attracted, and has had to endure the suppression of much
that was most precious in her peculiar individuality. Now, when another Age of
moral darkness has fallen upon mankind, she is coming at last to her own and has
begun to give expression to her most noble gifts: and now, by the kind
providence of God, another opportunity is offered her of doing again for mankind
the high service she did once in centuries long gone by.
That service was intellectual and spiritual. It made Irish history during the
sixth, seventh and eighth centuries a conspicuous part of religious European
history. It won for her that title of the Island of Saints and Scholars, which
remains to prove that Ireland was not always in that sad spiritual plight in which
she seems to be to-day.
The chief features of that age of light are well known. From many parts of
Europe students thronged into Ireland to sit at the feet of Irish Professors and
Divines, and Irish teachers travelled over sea and land to bring the gift of
heavenly and of earthly knowledge to yet unilluminated regions of Britain and
the Continent.
The three patron saints of Ireland, St. Patrick, St. Bridget and Columcille,
founded schools at Armagh, Kildare and in Iona. Hundreds followed their
example. Shrines of devotion and of

The genius of Ireland 105
learning were established in every part of the island. St. Finnian, travelling in
Britain and seeing the ignorance of the people, planned their conversion, and
returning to Ireland founded at Clonard that famous school whose students during
his lifetime numbered three thousand. Moville, Bangor, Lismore, Cork, Ross,
Glendalough, Innisfallen, were seats of noted colleges. Districts now looked on
in Ireland as remote were then educational centres whose circumference might
reach as far as France or Italy. The lonely island of Aran Mor, in the days of its
great teacher, St. Enda, was the resort of all the best minds in Ireland. The school
at Clonfert was planted by St. Brendan the Voyager, whose reputed travels, under
the title of Navigatio Brendani, were known throughout mediaeval Europe; it was
the seat of St. Fursa (whose account of his Visions excited so wide an interest at
one time that it has been held they offered suggestions even to the author of the
Divine Comedy), and of the illustrious St. Cummian, some of whose writings are
still extant, and who wins the admiration of the modern scholar by his intellectual
humility and by the vastness of his learning. Clonmacnoise, now a desolate ruin
in a lonely countryside, was founded by St. Kieran, and his cell soon became the
centre of a veritable city of students. Iniscaltra became so famous for its school
and monastery that an old record recounts how on one day there entered the
mouth of the Shannon seven ships, full of students from foreign parts, bound for
that little island on Lough Derg.
Aspirants, eager to gain and to bring back to their own darker homes the light
of Western wisdom, came from all and sundry regions of Europe. Dagobert, a
king of France, Aldfrid, king of Northumbria, St. Willibrord, a Saxon noble,
afterwards Archbishop of Utrecht, Agilbert, a Frank, and afterwards Bishop of
Paris, were among those educated at Irish schools. The Venerable Bede mentions
that crowds of Anglo-Saxons went over to study in Ireland, where he reports they
were kindly received and, without payment, were provided with books and with
instruction. Aldhelm, abbot of Malmesbury, records that, while Canterbury
School was not over-full, the English swarmed like bees to the schools in Ireland.
Visitors came too, it is said, from Gaul,
106 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
Germany, Italy, and even from Egypt.
Nor was this intellectual traffic one-sided. Irish saints and scholars went out
from their homeland diffusing their knowledge and leaving behind them in
Europe traces which remain to this day. St. Columbanus and St. Gall, of the
school at Bangor on Belfast Lough evangelised parts of Burgundy, Lombardy,
and Switzerland. Dungal, from the same school, was a friend of Charlemagne
and was the founder of the University of Padua. St. Aidan, of Galway, at the
invitation of Oswald, King of Northumberland, went over to help in the
conversion of the king’s subjects to Christianity, and founded the monastery of
Lindisfarne. He was the first in the line of Bishops to take their title from
Durham. His successor was Saint Finan of Tipperary, whose efforts (with those
of two other Irishmen, Cedd and Diuma) carried the Gospel far down into Central
England. Fergil, or Virgilius, became Archbishop of Salisbury. St. Fursa worked
for six years as missionary in East Anglia, and then went over to France, where
he earned a wide reputation for virtue and learning. St. Finbar of Connacht aided
in the conversion of Mercia, and developed the monastery of Glastonbury. It is
said that to-day 155 Irish saints are still venerated in Germany, 46 in France, 32
in Belgium, 13 in Italy, 8 in Denmark, Norway and Sweden.
Those who thus found in Ireland a fountain of knowledge at which they could
slake their thirst were not unappreciative beneficiaries; sometimes an old record
will give some quaint witness to the gratitude of eminent foreigners to the Irish
schools which had taught them so well.
Thus there is still extant a letter from Alcuin, the most learned man at the
court of King Charles of France, addressed in affectionate terms to “his blessed
master and pious father” Colcu, or Colgan, chief Professor at Clonmacnoise. Not
only did Alcuin send a letter, but he sent also 100 shekels of silver (5o from
himself and 5o from the king) to the brotherhood of Clonmacnoise as a gift, with
a quantity of olive oil for the Irish Bishops.
For a time fate rang down the curtain upon this scene of intellectual activity
and happiness. The Danes arrived, terrorising and destroying. Invasion followed
invasion. But when in AD 1014
The genius of Ireland 107
Brian Boru utterly defeated the Danes at the battle of Clontarf and set the land
free, missionary work was again resumed. This was the period when Irish
influence in Germany was at its height.
A monk from Donegal founded a monastery of St. James at Regensburg in
1076. Soon a daughter house was opened at the same place, dedicated to St.
Jacob. From this centre Irish influence spread in all directions. Twelve Irish
monasteries were founded in Germany and in Austria, at Wurzburg, Nurnburg,
Constanz, Vienna, Eichstadt, and other places. Irishmen coming directly from
their native land travelled far and wide through Europe carrying the Gospel, and
sometimes founding monasteries. Irishmen were chaplains of Conrad III and of
Frederic Barbarossa. Under the latter monarch a monastery was founded in what
is now Bulgaria, and an Irishman appointed abbot. John, Bishop of
Mecklenburg, preached to the Vandals between the Elbe and the Vistula. Pope
Adrian IV studied under an Irish professor in the University of Paris. The fame
of Irish saintliness and learning was established everywhere. Students still came,
like their ancestors, to visit this island so celebrated for its intellectual and
spiritual wealth.
But this revival burnt itself out, and no such flame has ever since been lit
again. With the Normans there was introduced a condition of permanent warfare,
which soon disintegrated Irish life. Suitable recruits were no longer sent out to
the Continent, and the great Irish monasteries in Germany and elsewhere were
either secularised, like that at Nürnburg, or turned over to local authorities, like
those at Vienna or Wurzburg.
Such, in brief, were the Christian schools, such the signal achievement which
won for Ireland that title which remains unforgotten as a call to aspiration,
showing that once she has been, and yet may be again, an island of saints and
scholars.
Long years of invasion and turmoil followed, but the settlers who came in this
period to Ireland from overseas did not obliterate this temperamental mysticism
of the native race. Indeed, in the era of Plantation it was noted that they soon
took on the general characteristics of the people they had come to dwell among
and became “more Irish than the Irish themselves”.
108 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
Early in the eighteenth century, as if to prove that the flame of mystical
genius, if overlaid, still burned in Ireland as strong as ever, there arose George
Berkeley, Bishop of Coyne, whose spirit of self-sacrifice and missionary
enthusiasm made him own brother of the ancient Irish saints. He foresaw the
future greatness of America and in his verses On the Prospect of Planting Arts
and Learning in America wrote the famous lines:
“Westward the course of empire takes its way.
The first four acts already past
A fifth shall close the drama with the day—
Time’s noblest offspring in his last.”
He conceived the project of founding a college in the Bermudas by a charter
from the crown for the Christian civilisation of America, and managed to get a
vote of £20,000 from the English House of Commons for the purpose. In 1728,
he sailed west and for three years—by way of preparation for Bermuda—lived
and laboured in Rhode Island. As the promised grant was withdrawn he was
obliged to return to Ireland, but not before he had planted in America the seeds of
his idealistic philosophy. Westward therefore as well as eastward the missionary
light of Irish Christianity has shone! Berkeley’s place in history, however, is due
to his metaphysical insight. His famous and often misunderstood doctrine of the
non-existence of matter means in reality that matter apart from its apprehension
by mind—the mind of man or the mind of God—has no existence at all. In other
words, he held, (it has been said) that the material universe can have no existence
apart from its inclusion in a great spiritual order, which one may call the life of
God. Since his day, illustrious critics have variously challenged, ridiculed,
pondered over, commended, admitted the validity or exposed the fallacy of his
arguments; but they have not ignored his philosophy. “It is a fact of history,”
writes one authority, “that Berkeley has employed the modem philosophical
world in a struggle, virtually about his new conception of the Universe, which
has lasted for nearly two hundred years.” Primate Darcy, in a sermon on
Berkeley in which he quoted from a number of contemporary philosophers,
concluded “My purpose
The genius of Ireland 109
in referring to these works of to-day, the writings of men who occupy a foremost
position in the world of thought in our time, is to show that the influence of
Berkeley in philosophic thought at the present time is more potent and more
creative than at any time in the past. Philosophy cannot get away from him.”
Berkeley died in 1753, a true successor of the saints and scholars of old and
perhaps the only Irishman who has earned an assured place in the main current of
world thought.
Now once again—among the manifold activities of the nineteenth-twentieth
centuries—Ireland has given conspicuous expression to this same spiritual gift in
a new form. “A man is hidden behind his tongue”, says an Arabian proverb. A
nation is hidden behind its literature. The writings of a people form a mirror in
which the popular mind and heart are reflected. A poet is not a creator only, but a
revealer; and he reveals, not only his own soul, but the soul of his people and of
his age. The recent revival of letters in Ireland has been written about in many
lands as an Irish Renaissance. And in the work of this Renaissance no human
quality has found such general or such felicitous and ardent expression as that of
spirituality.
In all ages nations have been proud of their poets. When they wish to display
their greatness, it is to their poets they point—the English to Shakespeare, the
Germans to Goethe, the Italians to Dante, just as long ago the Romans pointed to
Vergil and the Greeks to Homer. A country’s poets give the highest expression
of the national character. Set half-a-dozen poets of the Irish Revival beside a
similar group of to-day’s poets from England, or the Colonies, or from America,
and one of the traits which is seen at once to mark the Irish writers is the
vividness and ardour of their religious feeling. This feeling is not, of course,
absent from the contemporary poets of other lands: far from it. But it is not
elsewhere so pervasive, so emphatic, as in Irish verse, nor has it the same quality
of instinctive yearning and aspiration. No one can read the verse of Lionel
Johnson, of Katharine Tynan-Hinkson, of Pearse, of Dora Sigerson, of Joseph
Campbell in his earlier years, or of many another, without noting the devotional
and often mystical quality of the author’s temperament. Indeed, the wealth
110 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
of idealistic material is so great that it is some matter of surprise that no one has
yet published an anthology of Irish verse of this special type.
The two finest and most famous of Irish poets are, however, those in whose
works this spirituality shines out with the greatest brilliance and power. It is to
*
both Yeats and A.E. the one dominant thought, the one central theme. The hero
of their verse is not man the mortal, but man the immortal, and their sadness is
that of a spirit ill-content to dwell in a house of clay amid a world of illusions.
Yeats has spoken of “the disembodied ecstasy” of A.E.’s verse, and no two words
can better describe its special quality. “Be it thine,” writes A.E. of his own
poetry, “be it thine to win Rare vistas of white light, Half-parted lips through
which the infinite murmurs its ancient story … until thy song’s elation Echoes
the multitudinous meditation.” His verse is, in an extraordinary degree, aetherial,
and its ideals of human life noble and august. He loves his country, but has no
patience with those who are slaves of the embittering traditions of history. Of
himself and those who think like him he says:
“We are less children of this clime
Than of some nation yet unborn,
Or empire in the womb of time.
We hold the Ireland in the heart
More than the land our eyes have seen,
And love the goal for which we start
More than the tale of what has been.
We would no Irish sign efface,
But yet our lips would gladlier hail
The first-born of the coming Race
Than the last splendour of the Gael.
No blazoned banner we unfold,
One charge alone we give to youth,
Against the sceptred myth to hold
The golden heresy of truth.”
If only the voters of Ireland could reach up to this thought, how quickly might
the ship of State sail out from among the rocks

*
William Butler Yeats (1865–1939) was an Irish poet, dramatist, prose writer and one of the
foremost figures of 20th-century literature. George William Russell (1867–1935) wrote with the
pseudonym Æ (sometimes written AE or A.E.), was an Irish writer, editor, critic, poet, painter
and Irish nationalist.
The genius of Ireland 111
that now beset us, and seem likely to beset our children!
A.E. looks out upon a world full of unhappiness, and he sees human sorrow as
springing always from men’s forgetfulness of their divine origin and of that high
estate which once was theirs before they descended into this world of matter.
“We dwindle down beneath the skies, and from ourselves we pass away.” They
who forget they are from everlasting spiritual beings invoke misery. The
remembrance of this truth brings an inward joy which lies “far beyond earth’s
misery” and is the one road to real dominion and self-completion. Lesser goals
of effort than this delude and disappoint. The whole universe, in its vastness and
in its tiniest detail, is spirit-woven, and the Mighty Artist who reared “the
changing halls of day and night” shows forth His delight likewise in the
perfection of the wild flower of the field.
The volume of his Collected Poems, first published in 1913, and many times
reprinted, includes more than two hundred and thirty pieces, and runs to 369
pages. The treatment of a theme so vast and rich in so many brief lyrics leaves,
perhaps, on the reader a sense of fragmentariness. More than twenty years ago a
writer in an American paper, the Sewanee Review, spoke of A.E. as an “Irish
Emerson”. It is a suggestive comparison; but Emerson was a dreamer and a
thinker, while A.E., in his verse, appears rather as a dreamer and a singer. The
view of life and of the universe which A.E. presents is taken from the
Upanishads. The mythology which he employs is Celtic. Those readers,
therefore, who are trained in the classical tradition of the West may find
themselves here in a strange world. But the poet’s facility, the splendour of his
language, the delicacy of his colour-sense, the occasional magic of his descriptive
phrases, attract and charm; and no reader can be unmoved by the magnanimity
and loftiness of the poet’s thought. Technically the work does not always show
infallible clarity and finish. The poet seems a genius first, an artist in the second
place. Yeats, on the other hand, is a genius in the second place, an artist first.
If Mr Yeats has not in the same degree as A.E. an unquenched and
unquenchable assurance of the truth and reality of his vision, nevertheless his
work likewise depends for its individuality on a
112 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
rare and ardent idealism. The dominant mood of his poetry, taken as a whole, is
one of dream and reverie, of loneliness and longing. A belief in something better
than the actual and a desire to reach and to enjoy it, form the main source of his
inspiration. And though he has written in many moods, and ranged far in his
choice of themes, yet it is when he makes adoration his motive that his touch is
most sure, his eloquence most compelling. His idealism has many sides, and the
ideal types which his heart or fancy present to him are now of one kind, now of
another. Sometimes it is an image of ideal love on which he broods, sometimes
an image of ideal joy, sometimes of ideal beauty. But the one of which he
dreams more constantly than any other, the ideal of which he writes with a
reiteration that never seems to slacken or grow weary is a perfection of beauty—a
beauty still sensuous yet transcendently more fair than any that charms the senses
of mankind on earth.
With the world of ethics his idealism has little concern. Save in one brilliant
poem, he pays scant attention to perfection of character or to standards of
conduct. He has shown in the Countess Cathleen what he can do in this field
when he so wills. He has here taken an old legend which tells how once upon a
time an Irish Princess, in order to save her people, gave up for them the most
precious thing she possessed, her own soul. When she died, the Almighty
pardoned her and received her into heaven because, if her deed was evil, her
motive was divine. This story Mr Yeats weaves into a dramatic poem, in which
he does not bring out the conflict of the warring forces within the heroine’s breast
before she makes her awful decision, but emphasises the moral beauty of her act
and the religious significance of her ultimate forgiveness. The Lady Cathleen
seems not so much a mere being of the earth as the spirit of a selfless love
incarnate in a woman’s form. The whole poem is of so high and rare a loveliness
that none of Mr Yeats’ later work, brilliant though it be, seems quite to fulfil the
promise given here.
Joy is set by the poet among his ideals, and yet it plays but a small part in his
poetry. He writes with more affection of sorrow; and the lady of his dreams is
nearly always sorrowful, and never
The genius of Ireland 113
joyous. He speaks of joy as one of the marks of the land of his heart’s desire, and
in the Wanderings of Oisin he tells in a score of graceful lines the part joy plays
in the universe. But even here, when he sings joy’s praise, he carries little
conviction, because he sings always in a minor key. Nor does Yeats write of the
love of man and woman with the enthusiasm that marks most poets, and which
inspires them to their best verse. Only in one poem does he tell what is
essentially a love story, or seek to express that inspiration which impels the soul
to seek for happiness through a love union with its perfect mate. But here, in
Shadowy Waters (which, though in form dramatic, is in its nature lyric and
personal) the theme has done for Mr Yeats what it has done for almost every poet
who has treated it—it has ennobled his style and enabled him to write some of his
most exquisite and haunting poetry. Apart from this poem, Mr Yeats’s attitude
toward love is one of deprecation. As implied in many places and expressed in
his Rose of Battle, his view is that love brings contentment and repose which are
inimical to the divine hunger of the poet. It is to the sad, the lonely, the
insatiable, that Nature reveals her mysteries. The poet must abjure love and drive
it from him to “hide its face amid a crowd of stars.”
Doubtless the poet’s failure to write at length of joy and love and moral
perfection is not so much due to his loving these less, but to his loving another
ideal even more. The ideal which he prizes most highly is that of beauty. He
chants the praise of beauty in his lyrics, his narratives, his plays. He chanted it
when he was a boy, and he chants it now he is a man. So active is his
imagination when enkindled by the desire for beauty, that the poet seems able to
look at his ideal now from this angle, now from that, to see it in a hundred
different forms, and to sing it in a hundred different ways. And if he writes of
this theme late and early, he writes of it also with an emotion which, though it
may seldom be impassioned or rapturous, is always sincere and earnest and
profound.
The great function of poetry is to him the expression of beauty. He sees the
poets as “labouring all their days to build a perfect beauty in rhyme.” Nor could
they well choose a worthier theme,
114 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
since it is the love of beauty that has impelled men to the heights of epic
achievement (as in old Hellas and ancient Ireland). Moreover, beauty was,
indeed, the cause of creation, since God made the world that He might provide
the Angel of Beauty with a place where she might wander at will. In one poem
Mr Yeats claims that an aesthetic difference is an ethical one, and that ugliness is
unrighteous. “The wrong of unshapely things,” he cries, “is a wrong too great to
be told.” So monotheistic is he in his worship that when he turns to indite a poem
in honour of Erin he fears he may be guilty of unfaithfulness, and, therefore,
saves himself by propounding the belief that beauty is the tutelary Goddess of
Erin, and still loves that land as her peculiar haven and home on earth. In what
might seem intended as love poems Mr Yeats writes not so much of love as of
beauty. He praises his beloved because she reminds him of the loveliness that
has long faded from the world; he tells her that when she sighs, he hears White
Beauty sighing too, and that she seems to him an incarnation of that Angel of
Beauty to whom his heart is given. He does not seem self-forgetful, like the true
lover, but conscious of himself and of his dreams; so that, for instance, when he
tells his beloved that he spreads before her feet his dreams as cloths for her to
walk upon, he is careful to ask that she tread lightly.
This sensuous beauty, which Yeats so devoutly adores, he often personifies as
a woman or goddess of whom he is the humble devotee and priest. But at other
times he thinks rather of some ideal age or place where there is nothing, neither
form nor colour, nor odour, nor sound, that is not beautiful. Frequently he speaks
of bygone ages as possessed of a loveliness which, like Astraea, has long since
fled from earth. In one or two brief lyrics some favourite spot in Ireland like the
Lake Isle of Innisfree is painted as the ideal place of his dreams. But in his larger
works the dwelling-place and home of beauty is some imaginary land beyond the
known borders of the world—in The Wanderings of Oisin it is the Isle of the
Blessed; in The Land of Heart’s Desire it is the realms of Faery; in Where There
is Nothing it is the heaven of the mystic’s faith.
It has been Mr Yeats’s custom to place this halcyon home of
The genius of Ireland 115
Beauty in strong and striking contrast to the actual life of man on earth. The
workaday world he shows as a hard and sordid place, whose darkness he uses as
a foil to set off the glory of the land of his dreams. This opposition is, to him, not
a mere artistic device, but a profound fact of Nature, and it provides him with the
subject of some of his best poetry. Indeed, the poems which have appealed to his
readers as most sincere, and which are the most general favourites, are precisely
those in which this opposition is the crux and central theme.
In these points Mr Yeats’s method—if without injustice to his art one may
point for a moment to the foundations and the ground-plan on which he has
built—is to place the hero (or heroine) in the midst, with Earth on one side and
Elysium on the other, and then have him decide which of the two he will choose.
The making of the choice, the struggle to escape from earth, and the final
attainment of Elysium provide the plot. The hero’s weariness of earth, his
longing for Paradise, and his delight on reaching his haven, supply the emotion of
the piece. Names, dates, places may vary, but this plan varies not. Oisin, Maire
Bruin, Forgael, Paul Rutledge—mythic warrior, peasant girl, pirate, and
nineteenth-century country gentleman—all stand in similar dilemmas, all make a
similar election, and all reach similar goals. There is, however, one play which,
though it belongs to this class, yet stands by itself as apart from its fellows. This
is Cathleen Ny Houlihan. For in this piece the hero does not seek the personal
enjoyment of any delectable Paradise, but refuses the good things of earth that he
may the better do his duty and fight in his country’s cause.
Yet if in this large group of poems Mr Yeats changes neither the theme nor
the essentials of his plot, he does considerably change his point of view and his
treatment of the story. When he was young he looked at the matter from one
angle, and wrote The Wanderings of Oisin; when he was a little less young, his
point of view was changed, and he wrote The Land of Heart’s Desire; when he
reached middle age he saw it all in yet another way, and wrote Where There is
Nothing. In his youth his fancy broke its leash, and he revelled in the delights of
his dream-
116 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
Elysium. His hero of this period, Oisin, escapes forthright from earth and rides
with a fairy bride to the Isle of the Blessed, and the poet fills almost the whole of
his poem with enraptured descriptions of that wonderful world. But with
growing experience Mr Yeats’ perspective changed, and the thought of earth
became obtrusive. Maire Bruin, the main figure in The Land of Heart’s Desire,
did not find so quick or easy an escape to the place of her dreams as did Oisin. It
is only when Earth has grown at last unbearable that she calls for the fairies,
whom she has loved so long, to take her out of “this dull world.” Even then her
decision has to be fought out in a hard and bitter struggle, for earth has its ties,
and she cannot win her fairy land till she has broken the bonds of faith and home.
Paul Rutledge has a yet more arduous experience than Maire. Less fortunate than
she, he does not know where that which he desires is to be found. No fairy-child,
no princess from the Happy Isles, comes to his need. He must go out and search
for his ideal himself. He does so in a fashion which is, at least, uncompromising,
and becomes by turn tinker, monk, and self-appointed friar. But his goal remains
unknown till, at the very last, as he drops dying beneath the stones of the mob, he
cries “I go to the sacred heart of flame,” and finds his soul’s desire through
martyrdom. So hardly did Paul Rutledge attain what Oisin was given as a gift;
and so little is the reader told of that Paradise which in the earlier poem a
thousand glowing lines were hardly sufficient to describe.
Mr Yeats himself is acutely conscious of this change. He sees no more the
heavens opened, nor does he tell burning tales of dream-guided adventurers
forsaking all to seek the mystic home of Beauty. He cannot write now in that
high, happy strain. His songs no more thrill with faith and hope. He doubts. “Is
this my dream, or the truth?” he asks. Once he wrote a poem—The Rose of the
World—to protest against the false dream that “Beauty passes like a dream.”
Now he records the wisdom of the old men: “I heard the old, old men say, ‘All
that’s beautiful drifts away like the waters.’” He feels the loss and laments the
change. “I am worn out with dreams,” he cries; and again, “Now my
The genius of Ireland 117
heart is sore. All’s changed”—“My barren thoughts have chilled me to the
bone”—and
“The holy centaurs of the hills are vanished;
I have nothing but the embittered sun;
Banished heroic mother moon and vanished,
And now that I have come to fifty years
I must endure the timid sun.”
He tries to think, however, that if the fading of his early vision be sad, yet it
has its gains. Perhaps he was wrong then and is right now.
“Through all the lying days of my youth
I swayed my leaves and flowers in the sun;
Now I may wither into the truth.”
“The truth!” What, then is this truth which has come when joy is gone? One
reads The Green Helmet, and comes on the following lines, and wonders whether
they really can be written by the same pen as that which charmed all hearts not
long ago with a story of that Land of Heart’s Desire where beauty has no ebb,
decay no flood”:
“How shall I know
That in the blinding light beyond the grave
We’ll find so good a thing as we have lost?
The hourly kindness, the day’s common speech,
The habitual content of each with each,
When neither soul nor body has been crossed.”
Heaven, it seems, is closed. Only the earth remains. But when the poet took
this for the burden of his song, his power and his rapture left him. He is still the
craftsman, but he cannot move men’s spirits. Like his heroic Oisin, so soon as he
slips from his faery-steed and touches the common earth, his strength turns to
water and the years master him. “O, who could have foretold that the heart
grows old!” he cries. He has no tidings now. What is an Irish poet who has lost
his idealism? He is as a saint without the knowledge of heaven, as a scholar
without the knowledge of the earth.
But Mr Yeats has not spoken his last word. Progress moves not in a straight
line, but in a spiral. Wordsworth’s Child, who at
118 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
first saw all things apparelled in celestial light, and later, as he grew to man’s
estate, lost the happiness of this intuitive vision, found in later years the same
high wisdom restored and deepened through thought and contemplation. So may
it be with this poet whom God has gifted and man has justly honoured. Before he
lays down his pen he will, of a surety, see once again the gates of pearl cast wide,
and, in fuller, stronger tones than ever before, will sing in his old age the glories
of the Land of the Ever-Young.
The poems of Mr Yeats, with those of A.E., have made the name of Ireland
honourably known through the English-speaking world, particularly among the
educated and most influential classes. They have, in a dark and doubting age,
upheld with power and persuasiveness, the cause of idealism and of spirituality.
They have had the effect, throughout the Empire and in America, of connecting
this cause with the revival of letters in Ireland. It has been felt that the special
qualities of these poems are not merely personal, but are typical of the genius of
the Irish people.
Here lies the national significance of these two great poets’ work. Their
achievement is not the singular and unaccountable outburst of an extraordinary
talent; it is not unrelated to its environment, a flaming bush in a wilderness. On
the contrary, Mr Yeats and A.E. are children of their country. Their greatest and
most splendid quality is one which they inherit from Ireland. Their power of
vision is an Irish gift. It marked the Irish long ago, and it marks them now. What
is singular in their attainment is not that they possess the seer’s temperament, but
that to it they add a rare faculty of poetical expression. It is not their privilege to
sing of themes unknown or strange to the Irish people, but rather to give
utterance to aspirations which many among the Irish felt, yet none but themselves
can put in music or in words. Indeed, what these two men have achieved might
well be impossible had they not had the spirit of the people with them. For they
have done something which, in the realm of letters, is comparable with the work
of an ancient Irish missionary in the realm of religion. In an age when the
Philistines have captured the Ark of Beauty, when most poets sing of earthliness
and shadows and despair, here are two Irishmen singing, in strains of
The genius of Ireland 119
rapture and desire, tidings of joy and light and loveliness.
“Men yet shall hear
The Archangels rolling Satan’s empty skull
Over the mountain tops”
is continually the burden of their song. And where else in the wide world to-day
will this be found as the characteristic and dominant note of a nation’s
contemporary verse?
Perhaps the victory of the Archangels over Satan which Yeats foretold was
nearer than he knew. Perhaps had he learned where to turn his ear, he might have
found yet fairer songs to sing in his later years than he had found in his brilliant
youth.
Our poets saw in vision the eternal light of heaven shining afar and caught a
glimmer of its radiance down on this earth amidst the uncomprehending gloom of
human life. They expressed their vision in forms and images gathered from the
love of the ancient East or from the myths and faery legends of their own land.
They did not sing of the Marriage of Heaven and Earth, of the Sun God scattering
for ever the Spirit of Darkness, nor—as Shelley did—attempt in a hundred
impassioned lyrics to raise the chant of all created things hymning in adoration
the glory of a regenerated Universe.
Their imaginations ranged far and wide for thoughts and images through
Celtic or mediaeval or oriental myths and legendary lore; they did not seek their
inspiration from the one central source from which Columba and his fellow saints
and scholars derived their knowledge and their strength.
Now has come, now has spread far and wide through the globe a fuller, richer,
happier Message; the Message promised by Christ long ago and now at length
after well-nigh two millenniums brought by him and given in tones that are heard
only by spiritual ears (as He used to say when He taught “He that hath ears to
hear let him hear”). A poet-prophet of the East, a hero-saint of the ancient land
of Iran, Bahá’u’lláh, has brought, as God’s Messenger, Tidings of a New Heaven
and a New Earth. Tidings that Light’s Arrows have pierced the heart of
Darkness, that the battle which the Patron Saints of Ireland fought of Truth
against Error, Knowledge against Ignorance, Love against Hate, has
120 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
been won for us, and that Victory will descend when men stretch out their eager
hands to gather it. Blinded with self-desire, men and nations drain the bitter
dregs of disillusion and cannot see what spectral hand holds to their lips the cup
of death—cannot see the underlying cause of the world’s want and woe is
spiritual poverty.
What nation will be the first to behold the vision of truth, the first to declare
it? Might not their great tradition call the Irish to this task?
To consider in how marked a degree this precious gift of spirituality has been
theirs in the past: to look back at their history and see how the religious genius of
the people has over centuries made Ireland a lamp of Faith in a darkened world,
directing its light both East and West, to realise that still there burns deep in the
heart of the people that ancient fire: to hear to-day in our midst the voice of poets
beginning to raise again the strain so long unheard, and chant in the ears of a
forgetful world the praise of eternal beauty and eternal truth: thus to watch, to
listen, and to reflect is to be filled with hope that Ireland may not be slow to catch
the vision of the New Day, of the coming of the Kingdom of God, and that she
may do for mankind now such service as she did for the world long ago in the
hour of its darkness and its need.
Part II

To
Bahá’u’lláh
ONLY Beloved! With a heart on fire
And all my longings set in one desire
To make my soul a many-stringed lyre
For Thy dear hand to play,
I bend beneath Thy mercy-seat and pray
That in the strength of perfect love I may
Tread with firm feet the red and mystic way
Whereto my hopes aspire.
I have forgotten all for love of Thee
And ask no other joy from destiny
Than to be rapt within Thy unity
And—whatso’er befall—
To hear no voice on earth but Thy sweet call,
To walk among Thy people as Thy thrall
And see Thy beauty breathing throughout all
Eternal ecstasy.
Lead me forth, Lord, amid the wide world’s ways,
To bear to Thee my witness and to raise
The dawn song of the breaking day of days.
Make my whole life one flame
Of sacrificial deeds that shall proclaim
The new-born glory of Thy ancient name;
And let my death lift higher yet the same
Triumphal chant of praise!

Part III

Meditations, devotions and poems
For a seeker
I HAVE set forth as Thy pilgrim, my Lord; but there are many lands and
unknown seas to travel before I approach the threshold of Thy Sacred Shrine.
At every step I am admitted into a new realm, and at the end of each day’s
wayfaring I pitch my tent in a fresh El Dorado.
What earthly journey could be like this Journey! What adventure like this
Adventure! What were the possession of the whole world compared with the joy
of this Quest for Thee!
My longing for Thee ever increases. Wonder uplifts me. My heart leaps with
exultation, and trembles in awe. This gift of Thine is beyond all my hopes and
my imagining. I do not dream now of the shining domes of Thy far-distant
sanctuary. I am no longer restless nor impatient. It is enough for me to seek
Thee and to seek Thee, day after day.
O my God, my Beloved! Grant me at Thy hand a draught of the Wine of
Immortality that I may seek Thee through this world and all Thy hidden worlds
for ever and for ever.
LORD, I have launched out upon the vast ocean of Search in the barque of
Faith. I know that I shall never find Thee unless Thy hand direct me, and the
breath of Thy mercy bear me on the way. I am weak, and the source of strength
lies not in me.
Error perpetually wells up in my soul, estranging me from Thee.
Yet, do I seek Thee for ever! Everywhere I find traces of Thee, and I cannot
refrain from my seeking. Thy voice echoes in the still recesses of my heart, and
my longing for Thee gives me no rest.
O beloved One; my heart is emptied of all save Thee. Leave me not to my
loneliness. Breathe Thy Holy Spirit upon me, that I may be borne far away from
the world, and approach the threshold of Thy unity.

Meditations and devotions 123

O LORD of love, Giver of Knowledge!
The twilight of Thy dawn breaks upon my soul, and the shadows of illusion
flee before the white arrows of Thy Truth.
Slowly knowledge widens. Unfamiliar meanings gleam from familiar things.
Hidden chambers of treasure open before the outstretched hand of thought. I feel
like a child carried by magic into a far, strange land. Breathless with
astonishment, I behold wonders leap into being everywhere in endless variety.
But always the way of Truth is love, the key of Truth is love, and Truth’s own
self is love.
O MY Lord!
I have sought Thee all my life, yet I still wander in a chequered world of light
and shadow. Oh, lift me at last into the pure splendour of Thy Truth beyond the
reach of any darkness that I may behold Thee as Thou art, and live in Thy
continual presence evermore.
THE darkness changes and pales, but no light breaks. Error grows intolerable,
but Truth still is hidden out of sight. I rest not, but I never reach my goal.
Yet, do I not ask anything, but to journey onward and onward. My path is of
Thy making, and Thou leadest me on the way. I ask no more, and I desire no
more.
124 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

I HAVE left behind me impatience and discontent. I will chafe no more at my
lot. I commit myself wholly into Thy hands, for Thou art my guide in the desert,
the teacher of my ignorance, the physician of my sickness.
I am a soldier in my King’s Army; I have given up my will to Him, and my
life is His to dispose of as He may please.
I know not what fate Thou designest for me, nor what work Thou hast
ordained for me, nor will I enquire nor seek to know. The task of the day suffices
for me, and all the future is Thine.
Little by little Thou trainest me. Little by little Thou changest weakness to
strength, doubt to faith, perplexity to understanding. When I am fit to bear the
burden Thou wilt lay it on my shoulders. When I am prepared to take the field
Thou wilt assign me a place in Thy army of Light. Now I have no other duty
than to equip myself for Thy service.
With eagerness and patience, with hope and gratitude I bend to the task of the
hour lest when Thy call to battle comes I be found unready.
The task is hard. But I know it has come from Thy hand; therefore it shall be
the choice of my mind, and the delight of my heart. I will utter no word of
complaint, nor admit a thought of grief. I will follow in the footprints of all those
who have sought Thee for love of Thee. I will find in effort my rest and my
peace, and out of pain I will wring a hidden joy.
Thus, 0 Beloved, Whose sweet voice I hear calling me, and still calling me, I
will draw near to Thy abode bearing Thee the only gift Thou wilt accept, the only
gift I have to offer: the gift of my heart.
Meditations and devotions 125

FOR every void there is a filling, and to every prayer there is an answer.
All tribulation has its ending, and to every seeking there is a finding.
For the weary, rest is waiting, and for the lonely, love.
Therefore will I be content, and will keep a heart at peace. My faith is
founded upon Truth, and I will bear witness through every trial to the goodness
and mercy of God.
ALONE in the darkness before the dawn I repair to Thy shrine, and bow
before Thy sacred threshold. In the rapture of communion with Thee, self and
the world momentarily fall away. The veil of Thy Beauty is lifted, and the
sweetness of Thy Mercy enfolds me …
On the far horizon darkness breaks and flees, and through the tracery of
leafless boughs I watch the brightening sky. Day calls me hence, and I must
leave Thy sanctuary for the roaring city and the busy mart. Grant me, O Lord,
Thy continuing presence and protection, that when night brings me back to Thy
temple I may not come to Thee in estrangement nor in shame. Vouchsafe me, all
the day through, Thy help and strength. Above the babel let me hear Thy Voice.
In the turmoil let Thy Peace hold possession of my heart. When I walk among
the idols that once I worshipped, let me not heed them nor remember them, being
enrapt with utter love of Thee.
126 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

TO Thee now, O Beloved One, the Merciful, I bring my weakness, my
consciousness of failure—to Thee I pour out my griefs—to Thee I con fide my
disappointments; and from my knees I rise leaving behind me all my burdens,
freed from every sadness, strengthened by Thy strength, arrayed in faith, seeing
Thy sunshine everywhere and desiring to find throughout the day opportunities of
proving my gratitude to Thee for Thy abundant gifts.
IN the growing light of self-knowledge, O God, I stand revealed to myself,
and conscience-stricken I come to Thee in horror and contrition. Till now I never
recognised the baseness of my state nor suspected the depth of my guilt in Thy
eyes.
Fill my heart so full of love that there shall be no room for anger; so full of
hope that there shall be no room for fear; so full of radiant joy that sadness may
not enter nor approach. Deprive me, 0 God, of all the world holds dear, and of all
that men may offer unto men; bestow on me pain, penury and humiliation if by
this means I may be purified of my sin, and freed from these anarchic passions.
Spare me not. But grant me in the end attainment to my Goal: the knowledge
of Thy Truth, the blessing of Thy Love.
Meditations and devotions 127

OUT of the dark depths of my being there well up continually hateful desires.
The Enemy of my life has his stronghold in the dim mysterious background of
my consciousness which lies beyond the reach of my will.
Horrid thoughts and impulses assail me unawares, and in weak moments. I
struggle, and I will not yield; but I cannot conquer. Legion succeeds legion, and
the tumult is endless.
I long for Thee, 0 my God: for Thy Truth, Thy Glory and Thy Peace. But
how can I win my goal while I lie thus open to my foes, and the Evil Principle
has its seat within my heart!
In desperate need, in conscious impotence I turn to Thee. Make me anew, O
Lord! Leave me not to this monster who harbours within me. Deliver me from
this satanic self. Cleanse my whole being, and light within me such a flame of
love as will bum darkness and its brood out of my heart for ever.
O MY Lord, how can I ask to be delivered from these tests and trials that
bring me so much suffering and anguish! They come from Thee, awakening me
from self-delusion, and revealing my weakness. I stand before Thy Judgment
Seat, uncloaked, dishonoured. Horror overwhelms me and abases me. Then at
last shame stings me to life, and remorse spurs me to escape from the cause of
this misery.
My Lord, I do not shun pain in Thy path. Whatever it cost me, do not permit
me to delay on my journey to Thee, nor to turn aside from Thy way. Send me
whatever difficulties or suffering my soul shall need to cleanse and purify it
utterly of all that is false and wicked. Help me to grow in self-knowledge and
wisdom, and to put into practice what I learn, till each weakness is turned into
strength, and I pass into the realm of Thy might through the gates of victory.
128 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

O LORD!
Thy mercy is endless and Thy love cannot be compassed by gratitude or
praise or knowledge. I adore Thee ever more and more; I am overwhelmed with
wonder and drawn to Thee in longing and rapture. Yet, this lesser self, this
narrow I with whom I am involved turns from Thee again and again and breaks
away, flouting Thy law in open rebellion. Ashamed and in utter misery I turn
back. I do not dare to approach Thee, but kneel far away in a wretched place, an
alien. I cannot understand why I fall away from what I truly desire; and I despair
of myself. The desolation of loneliness overwhelms me.
But Thou dost not despair of me. Thy forgiveness descends and touches me
ere I raise my eyes to look towards Thee. Thy mercy enlightens me. Thy love
pours warm hope again into my heart, and Thou leadest me back to walk in the
courts of Thy Spiritual Palace.
Yet, of my own strength I cannot make myself an abiding place close to Thee.
There lingers in me the foreboding that again I shall stumble and fall away from
the sweetness of this communion with Thy love.
O compassionate almighty God, I commit myself in utter humility to Thy
boundless mercy, begging Thee to save me (I know not how) from this Horror,
and to vouchsafe me that which is my true, my only desire—to attain to Thy
Presence, to know and to obey Thy Truth.
Meditations and devotions 129

To assailing doubts
I WILL have God or nothing.
I will not accept that which you offer.
I will not seek help from the world, for it passes and has no strength; nor from
ambition, for it cannot satisfy; nor from money, for no man has that to sell which
I desire.
I have beheld the Truth, and I will not forget it.
I have heard the promise of my Lord, and I will trust my all to it.
You afflict me, but you will not capture my heart.
You are many now, but you will become few. You seem strong, but your
strength is already passing away. You are God’s enemies, liars against the Truth,
and I am girded with God’s strength to master and subdue you. I will not cease
from this battle till I have used you that you will never raise your heads from the
dust to threaten me again.
O GOD!
Help me to give battle to the Enemy, and cease not; but ever to keep my heart
in peace.
Help me to be the servant of my fellow servants, and to find in this servitude
infinite freedom.
Help me to turn away from the semblance of beauty which lies about me, and
to seek in my heart the eternal beauty.
Help me to pass beyond love and hate that in self-abandonment
I may cast myself at the feet of the Lord of Joy. Amen.
130 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

KEEP Thou, O God, the door of my heart that no evil thought proceed from it;
and guard my lips that they utter no uncharitable word.
Teach me to look for the good in others that I may rejoice in it; and for the
evil in myself that I may amend it.
Watch over my actions that I do no injustice, nor cause unhappiness to any
one.
Divest me of pride that I may count myself less than any other, and may
become the servant of all for love of Thee, my Lord.
DEAR God of Splendour, Whose light is greater than my darkness, and
Whose love is stronger than my loneliness, end forever with one shaft from the
Bow of Thy Glory this night of error wherein I wander and am lost.
Light in my heart the fires of love, 0 God, that being delivered from all selfcentred desire I may love Thee for Thine own sole sake without hope of reward
here or hereafter, or thought of any heaven save this enraptured abandonment of
love for Thee.
MAKE my heart, O God, as this unshadowed mountain lake that sets its face
forever toward heaven, and in its calm depths reflects the peace of Thy remote
vast worlds of light.
Meditations and devotions 131

A vision of God’s triumph
OUT of the depths I greet the sunlit heights. Out of gross darkness I sing
hymns of light.
Thy Glory has spread across the heavens, Thy Beauty has kissed the mountain
tops, and Thy Love beats upon the hearts of men.
The doom of the Night has sounded. The troops of darkness gather in the
valleys. The stars have fallen. The skies are cleft asunder, and far in the
empyrean from the Fountain of Knowledge pours the river of life, and the hosts
of heaven chant the Glory and the Victory of God.
The peoples tremble in their sleep. The nations are shaken to their base.
The gates of Hell pour forth the last of their legions.
Where can the Night flee, or the armies of Satan take refuge? Death descends
upon them. Despair hardens their hearts. Breathing destruction they are
themselves destroyed.
For the Glory of God has encircled the world. His love has filled the earth.
The treasure chambers of heaven are thrown wide, and the gifts of the Most High
are showered upon Mankind.
There shall be no more death nor oppression nor tears. God has ascended His
throne. He has taken possession of the hearts of men.
Therefore from the darkness with hymns of light I greet the Source of Light,
and from the depths give answer to the heights.
132 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

A vision of the day of judgment
ONE touched my eyes. I looked and saw above the Mountain of Holiness the
light break. And a Voice above the Mountain called to me and said:
“That thou seest is the Dawning of the Judgment. Therefore, repent, lest thou
be found among the workers of inquity.
“Woe to them that have thought to hide their evil deeds in the gloom of their
misbelief, and to keep their wickedness secret from their Lord.
“Woe to them who through My long forbearance have imagined Me forgetful,
and ignorant of their guilt.
“Woe to the oppressors, and to them that wrong the poor, though it be in ever
so little.
“Woe to them that have made My Holy Name a cloak for injustice, and have
stamped on My Truth the image of their own base desire.
“Woe to them that misguide My people, reviling My Messengers and
traducing My Gifts.
“Woe to them that lift their strength against My strength, and utter blasphemy
against My Word.
“Woe to them that turn away from My Light, and seek the shelter of the
darkness.
“Their hour is come, and the Seal of My Covenant is set upon their doom.”
The Voice ceased. I watched the dawn grow clear, and the risen Sun pour its
beams from the east to the uttermost west, paling the last lone star of morning.
The glory of the light ran burning through the sky. At its caress the hidden
beauty of the world came forth unveiled. The air instinct with fire trembled in
ecstasy. The winds, the seas joining in nature’s hymeneal joy chanted the bridal
song of Earth and Heaven.
But man, afar, alone, lay unaware, dreaming of vanities, drugged in sleep.
Meditations and devotions 133

JOY is from Eternity!
Joy is more ancient than Time—vast as infinitude!
Out of joy doth all proceed, and in the arms of joy is Creation upheld!
Joy is in the Beginning, Joy is before the founding of the worlds!
Joy is the mighty, the impregnable, the everlasting.
Joy is the life and light of all; and naught exists that is not
filled with the breath of joy.
The voice of joy breaks forth on every hand in water, in wind, in rustling leaf
and singing bird; and listening night lays her hand upon the earth’s wild heart to
hear the universal chant of joy float from the fiery stars.

O God, O God, the dawn of joy is broken!
The flood-gates of light are open, and joy descends in torrents on the earth.
The frosts of life melt in the sunshine of Thy joy. Thy kiss of joy has touched
all, sweetened all!
Thy joy triumphant conquers the heart of man, and in the depth of our being
joy awakes.
There is no room for sadness, for doubt. Within, without, joy fills all space,
all time, all thought.
The prophet’s voice, the lover’s heart, proclaim the victory of joy. Far and
wide, in every clime, in every land, the soul of man wakens to join at last that
triumph-song of praise which for long ages Truth, unheard of men, has sung to
God in solitude.
134 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
For Ireland
LOOK Thou, O Father, upon this land where once Thy Son’s name set hearts
on fire and His light shone in lonely splendour across the darkness of the west.
Now in this Advent of a mightier Day awake anew that power of vision, that
readiness to answer Thy clear call. Make us on whom the fullness of the times
has come, prove ourselves true heirs of all that is most heroic in our past. Use
once again, but now for a yet larger end, the spiritual gifts Thou hast vouchsafed
this people. Let them swiftly arise as one in common acclamation of the Day of
Glory.
Thou hast in this Great Age ordained the nations of the west to bear to the
world the Message of Thy regeneration of the whole human race. Guide, 0
Father in heaven, the people of this land to the path Thou hast appointed them.
Kindle the flame of adoration in our hearts; teach us the joy of the soul’s
surrender to its God. Speed us on our forward way. In our share of service to
this crowning Day of Days let us find at last the challenge and the meaning of our
country’s ancient title, Inisfail, the Isle of Destiny.
Meditations and devotions 135
For father and mother
O WATCHFUL and loving Lord! Keep our little ones this day under Thy
protection. Permit no evil influence to reach or to come near them. Preserve
them from illness, from accident, and from all mishap. And in the evening bring
them home to their rest in safety and happiness.
PRAISE be to Thee, 0 God, Who hast given to these children the boon of
earthly life, and brought them thus far upon the road that leads to life eternal!
O Thou of many gifts, vouchsafe these little ones the mortal boon of health,
prosperity and happiness; and since these blessings soon must pass away and be
no more, admit them to Thy boundless worlds of love, endow and so train their
hearts that they may be able to receive and hold fast for ever in joy the
knowledge of Thy coming and Thy glory. Thou art the All-Compassionate, the
All-Wise.
THIS home is a garden, 0 Lord, which Thy hand has planted in the world, and
the hearts of these children are Thy flowers. Do Thou tend them and nourish
them.
Pour down the rays of Thy truth upon them. Breathe Thy Holy Spirit upon
them at every breath. Let Thy mercy descend on them like refreshing rain.
So shall these flowers of Thine mature, and bloom in beauty, and shed afar
the fragrance of Thy love and remain thine to their lives’ end.
136 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

PRAISE be to Thee, dear Lord, Who grantest to Thy servants bounty upon
bounty. Thou bestowest on us the marriage-blessing of children bringing with
them a thousand delights; and in this very gift Thou openest to us of Thy grace a
new world of service to Thee, a new road to Thy good pleasure and favour.
Help us, in love and gratitude to Thee, so to direct and train these little ones
that they may become men and women after Thine own heart, and may take their
place as Thy lamps shining brightly in a dark world.
O THOU, the Lover, the Creator and the Lord of these children, help us their
parents to guard and train them not through human love alone, but as an act of
love for Thee, and of obedience to Thy command.
Grant us selflessness and devotion, that we may be able in our hearts to hear
Thy bidding, and understand Thy will for these little ones.
Help us to do for them our utmost in Thy name, and in calm trust to leave the
rest to Thee, the All-wise Who lovest these Thy children better yet—far better—
than any human parent may love his child.
LET Reverence towards Thee, dear Lord, and kindness towards all that lives
be graven deep into these children’s hearts.
Give to us, their parents, wisdom and steadfastness, that we may unfold to
them, little by little, at the right time and in the right way, the knowledge of Thy
Truth, and by the example of our lives may amend whatever is amiss in our
teaching.
Let them increase day by day in spiritual strength that they may learn of Thee
the mystery of prayer, and may attain the reward of conscious communion with
Thy Spirit.
Meditations and devotions 137

O FATHER in heaven, Who givest to a parents’ intercession a special
privilege, hear Thou our prayer for these children whom Thou hast entrusted to
our care.
Protect them, we beseech Thee, against the evil that arises in their own hearts,
against the contagion of their parents’ frailties and imperfections, against the
power of those whose hearts are turned from Thee.
Help us to pray for our children with concentration and humility of spirit, and
by force of prayer offered in Thy Name to keep back, far from them, the evil
influences that seek their destruction.
O THOU Who hast blessed us with Thy gift of children, let not the wonder
and the happiness of these days of their infancy ever pass wholly from our hearts!
Grant us a strong undying memory of whatever is most precious in these
fleeting days, that in the aftertime when our little ones are no longer little we may
still keep in our hearts countless images and echoes of their babyhood, may see
again their open innocent faces, may hear their voices striving to imitate their
elders’ speech and recall these tireless infant feats of growing knowledge and
gathering strength.
So shall the unworldly beauty of these childhood days abide with us forever,
and not be wholly lost in the ripe happiness of the later time.
138 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

“Of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.”
GRANT to these little ones, O Lord, that the gifts and qualities which now are
theirs through weakness they may make their own by strength. Let them through
all the years retain this child-like heart, continuing humble and receptive as now,
full of wonder, eager to learn. Increase day by day and year by year their faith
that as the children of a Higher Home than this they may become heirs of
Eternity and earn the blessed fruits of this
Divine Age of Fulfilment. Amen.
HERE, O Lord, within the precincts of Thy protection, Love is king and Faith
and Hope are the lords of thought. But in the world without, Faith and Hope
wander in a wilderness and a stranger sits upon Love’s throne.
Be Thou, O Lord, the strength and shield of these little ones from their life’s
beginning to its very end. Grant that their love and faith and hope may prevail
against every enemy and put to shame all doubt and disbelief. Give them
fortitude and power that through childhood and manhood, in prosperity and in
adversity, they may continue that journey toward Thee which here they have
begun, and may to their lives’ end bear witness to Thy truth and remain firm in
Thy covenant.
Meditations and devotions 139

O GOD, look on us who with ceaseless care keep watch and ward over these
children, and suffer not our anxiety for them to become a sign of lack of trust in
Thee.
We acknowledge that they are in Thy safe keeping. It is for Thee to appoint
unto them their tasks in life, and Thou wilt bestow on them ample strength and
means to perform all that Thou requirest.
Help us to pass on to them the divine Message of the Day of God to give to
them the best we have to give, and doing this, to leave their souls to Thee in
perfect trust.

PRAISE be to Thee, O God, for Thy bounty to the weak, the young, the
humble, and for Thy power whereby Thou doest whatsoever Thou wiliest,
unhelped, unhindered, uncomprehended by the thoughts of men!
Thou puttest down the mighty, and dost exalt them of low estate.
Thou hidest Thy mystery from the wise and learned, and revealest it to them
who are as babes.
The scholar and philosopher see and perceive not, read and understand not;
the child beholding Thy beauty steps into Thy Kingdom.
O Loving Lord, Who hast never turned away from a longing heart, nor an
appealing cry, we pray then by Thy Most Great Name to deal with these little
ones—these tender branches of the tree of life—according to Thy all perfect
knowledge and desire.
140 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

O LORD, look upon these little ones, children of Thy covenant born of those
whose hearts are turned to Thee. Keep them from the first unto the last under
Thy protection and suffer them not to follow any desire save what may become
servants of Thy truth, lovers of Thy Beauty.
HEAR Thou, O God, our prayer for the children of this Age throughout the
world!
Look with pity on those whose parents have not turned their hearts to Thee
nor humbled themselves before Thy Manifestation. By Thy boundless mercy and
Thy prevailing will, deliver them out of the darkness that surrounds them, and
draw them toward Thy light. Create in their souls a hunger and thirst for
righteousness, a longing for spiritual truth; and prepare their minds to listen for
Thy voice and to welcome Thy glad tidings.
And now, O God, we beg Thee for these our children and for all others born
beneath Thy covenant that Thou wilt endow them with power to recognise and to
use to the utmost the blessing Thou hast given them. Grant them strength to
stand fast by Thy truth, to uphold Thy cause, and in their time to spread far and
near the knowledge of Thy glory and dominion.
FATHER of mine, and of my little son who kneels at my side and lifts his
voice to Thee, hear Thou his prayer and mine. Protect those whom he loves and
prays for. Lead him onward and ever onward in Thy way till he shall understand
that within his weak and mortal body is hidden the sacred light of Thine
imperishable Presence.
Meditations and devotions 141

O TRANSCENDENT and Incomparable Lord!
Thou hast bidden us look to Thee as to our Father in heaven; teach me to keep
in my heart this chosen Name of Thine, that I may discern the true ideal of
fatherhood, and learn what Thou wouldst have an earthly father be. Strengthen
me with Thy Spirit that I may deserve the trust, the obedience and the love of my
little ones. Make me remember that they will learn the meaning of fatherhood
from their earthly father, and forbid, O Lord, that I by my unworthiness should
lead Thy children astray in their first thoughts of Thee. Thou art the Everpresent,
the All-wise.
THERE was one who, being crossed, spoke to his son in anger, and saw the
child’s face change in fear.
Thereafter, praying in penitence, he heard the Voice of the Spirit speak to
him:
“Think not to number this weak one among thy possessions, nor imagine him
to be thy creation. Thou callest him thy son. Yet within his infant soul lies
hidden that which is deeper than thy knowing. In heaven his spirit stands now
among the angels of My presence, and here on earth the sword of My justice
protects and avenges him against all, and especially against thee. Love thou thy
son, and love thyself in him. Teach him My way, and walk in it thyself that thou
mayest be his guide. He is not thine, but Mine. Therefore, in all thou dost with
him keep Me in remembrance, and fear Me. This is thy duty. See that thou fulfil
it always, and slack not therein.”
142 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

O LOVING Lord!
To the mountain-stream Thou hast given its bubbles that dance and tremble
and break in light.
To the forest depths Thou hast given the fresh flowerbuds that burst and open
and unfold their tender petals in perfect beauty.
To me Thou hast given the first baby-kiss of this little one who presses her
tiny lips upon my lips in love.
LITTLE one, little one of my heart, I am thy first love and the first to give thee
a heart in love.
When I come near, thou smilest and stretchest out thy little hands. And when
I lift thee to me, thou foldest thine arms about my neck, and pressest thy smooth
cheek to mine, calling me love names in thy baby-talk.
What is there so sweet as love! and what love is so sweet as love at its
dawning, new love, first love!
Yet night by night I kneel, and beg of Him Who answers every prayer that
through the coming years He will make ever more deep and sweet this early love
of ours.
Meditations and devotions 143

O LITTLE one, my Una, April’s child, thou breath of the spring wind
embodied!
The bluebells cluster about thy knees; overhead the giant beech trees spread
their half-unfolded leaves; across the meadow the cuckoo calls, and from the
distant bog comes the curlew’s lonely cry.
How happy art thou, leading the revel of the woods, their native queen, for
whom a thousand springs have come and gone to weave thy flower-beauty, and
to find their meaning and perfection in these fresh lips and laughing eyes of thine.
O little one, joys more rare than these await thy wakening heart! A richer
spring has cast its bounty at thy feet, a greater glory shines from another Heaven.
And never morning breaks nor evening falls but lovers’ prayers go forth to beg
the early vision of God’s Golden Age for thee who playest here thinking all
happiness is already thine!
CHILD of my heart, call not me your Father; and this dear wife of mine that
gave you birth, call not her your mother. Think not the home we make for you is
your True Home. The life that is bestowed on you through us will soon pass
away and perish; but you, my son, you will not perish.
This life is a steed to bear you to the Kingdom of Eternity, of which you are
born a Prince. The Ruler of that Kingdom is your Father. His Palace is your
Home. You are heir to a mighty princedom because you are born His son.
Ride straight and fast to take your heritage. Fear no danger. Stop not for
flood nor foe. Look not to right nor left. Your Father waits for you.
Ride on. Rest not. Remember you are the son of a King.
144 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

GOOD-BYE, my baby boy, good-bye; you are gone from us for ever!
What love did you bring with you into the world!
What love did you stir and quicken in your father’s heart.
With what love have I watched you, played with you, tended you in all
conditions, at all hours, by day and by night; and who was happier than I!
How many scenes made beautiful by love, and filled with joy unroll before
my eyes. Again I see our child of longing, the first born in his first sleep: the
young adventurer voyaging from chair to chair: the blue-clad boy among the
buttercups seeking to make playmates of the eluding lambs …. But all this is
past. You are gone from us, my baby-boy, and have no being now save in the
close warm strong embrace of your mother’s memory and mine.
So must it be.
The bud perishes that the blossom may shed its fragrance, and babyhood
yields its place to the larger life of the boy.
And have not you, my little newcomer, my little four-year-old-son, have not
you all that the baby who brought you to me had—and how much more. What
was all that baby-sweetness of yours which is now gone by save the light you
cast before you on your way to me! You too, in your turn, will pass away from
me, and the years will ever bring to you change upon change. Deepening
happiness awaits you. You will pass from knowledge to knowledge, from
strength to strength. And through all the years, you and I, please God, will be the
closer friends and comrades because we have loved each other so dearly in the
baby-days gone by.
Meditations and devotions 145

WHILE they are at your side, love these little ones to the uttermost. Forget
yourself. Serve them; care for them; lavish all your tenderness on them. Value
your good fortune while it is with you, and let nothing of the sweetness of their
babyhood go unprized. Not for long will you keep the happiness that now lies
within your reach. You will not always walk in the sunshine with a little warm,
soft hand nestling in each of yours, nor hear little feet pattering beside you, and
eager baby voices questioning and prattling of a thousand things with ceaseless
excitement. Not always will you see that trusting face upturned to yours, feel
those little arms about your neck, and those tender lips pressed upon your cheek,
nor will you have that tiny form to kneel beside you, and murmur baby prayers
into your ear.
Love them and win their love, and shower on them all the treasures of your
heart. Fill up their days with happiness, and share with them their mirth and
innocent delights.
Childhood is but for a day. Ere you are aware it will be gone with all its gifts
for ever.
146 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

WE are thy teachers because God has appointed us. You are to hear us
because God wishes you to do so. He made us your father and mother, because
He chose that you should be taught by us.
We provide you with food and clothing and warmth. This is good; but the
good of it will not last forever. The truth we teach you is the greatest of all the
gifts we have to give you. Nothing else is important compared with this. Truth
and the effects of truth last for ever: not only for a little time. The teaching
which God has told us to give you will make you more happy than clothes or
houses or pleasure or money. People cannot be happy without truth, even on this
earth: in the next world we shall be very unhappy without it.
Remember, these teachings are of more value than all else we have to give
you. We teach you because we wish to obey God. We teach you not only
because we love you very much, but for God’s sake.
To teach you as God would have you taught is not easy. We are not so wise
nor so good as we should like to be; nor even so wise and good as we hope soon
to become. God himself alone is a perfect teacher. We pray God constantly to
help us; and because we so truly wish and strive to please Him He strengthens us
with the power and wisdom of His Spirit. Whatever is true in our teaching, and
whatever is good and right in it comes not from us, but from God.
Meditations and devotions 147

THE greatest benefit which we have to confer on you is: Guidance to God.
When God chose us to be your parents He commanded us to offer you this
guidance. Therefore, it is by His will that we give you His Holy Teaching. We
speak to you of Him and of His prophets, we surround you continually with
thoughts of faith and worship, and we never cease to pray for you. We cannot
compel you to learn the lessons which we teach; we would not compel you if we
could, for God intends our wills to be free. You must choose for yourself Your
mother and I are trying—as best we may—to follow the leading of that Guidance,
and it is our hope and prayer that you will travel with us. We should be very
lonely if we had to take one step without you. For this teaching which God has
given us to pass on to you is the most precious thing we have to give you: more
precious far than food, or clothes or schooling, or even life itself—for this
knowledge is ETERNAL life.
FILL Thou, O God our home with harmony and happiness, with laughter and
delight, with radiant kindliness and overflowing joy, that in the union of our
hearts Thy love may find a lodging place, and Thou Thyself mayst make this
home of ours Thine Own!
148 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh

UNTO Thee, O God, we dedicate this home. Cleanse it from all that is alien
to Thee that it may become fit for Thy acceptance, and may be to friend and
stranger as to ourselves a place of peace, a refuge from materialism, a herald of
Thy Kingdom.

O GOD, make Thou this home of ours the garden of affection, a ripening
place of love, where the hidden powers of our hearts may unfold, expand and
bear the fruit of an abiding joy.

GLORY and honour, praise and thanksgiving be unto Thee for ever from us,
and from all mankind!
Thou art the One God, the Boundless, the Eternal, Who in Thy creation hast
unveiled Thy Majesty and revealed Thy love.
For our sakes Thou hast called from infinitude this realm of space and
moulded it to serve the uses of the soul.
For our sakes Thou hast laid upon eternity the semblance of bonds, and
measured Time to us with fingers of gold and silver light.
For our sakes Thou hast brought us forth from the void of nothingness, and on
the mirror of our being cast the beauty of Thy Own similitude.
Meditations and devotions 149

PRAISE be to Thee Who hast called into being Thy worlds of Time and of
Eternity to give utterance to Thy love. Thou hast made all things for man and
man for his own glory and blessedness (not for Thine!) In his being Thou hast
hidden Thy light; on his heart Thou hast printed Thy image. Thou hast placed the
knowledge of Thyself and of Thy heaven before his face, and laid the way thereto
plain and open at his feet.
Thou hast commanded from the beginning Thy covenant with man to deliver
him from mortality and to grant him the freedom of Thy eternal Kingdom.
Age after age Thou hast sent Thy prophets to renew the same, to bear Thy
children love-messages from Thee, and to bestow on them new and ever richer
gifts.
Praise be to Thee, O God, from us who remember our benefits, who recount
our blessings, and Who from our hearts give thanks unto Thee, the Beloved.
Praise be to Thee Who hast granted us birth in this time of wonder, this great
age of breaking light!
We have walked in pride before Thee, but Thou hast overcome us by Thy
humility.
We have turned from Thy presence, but Thy love has overtaken us, and drawn
us home to Thee.
We have earned the wages of sin, but Thou hast brought to us Eternal Life.
Praise be to Thee Whose compassion has overshadowed us, whose
forgiveness has descended upon us, Whose mercy has given us life, Whose hand
has guided us to the highway of Thy Kingdom, Who chose for Thyself exile and
bonds that Thou mightest redeem us.
O Thou Whose holiness and might are above Thy creatures’ praise, accept
from us who love and worship Thee this praise we offer.
A little child shall lead them
Often with enchanted pleasure
Have I sped an evening’s leisure
Taking to me for a guide
From my lonely fireside
Homer or Scheherazade
And the wondrous tales they made
Of a world beyond the dawn
Where magic and her brood were born.
Whoso enters there will meet
Sorceress and grim Afreet
Heroes go adventuring
Carpets fly and sirens sing
Gardens where prodigious gems
Nod on all the flower-stems
Lavish on a beggar’s chalice
Wealth that would have decked a palace.
Marvel treads on marvel’s heels
Till the dizzy Reason reels
And e’en Fancy is perplexed
Wondering what can happen next
This I read, and thought it all
Gorgeous but chimerical—
Till the day I married you
And then I found it all was true!
Ghoul and wizard, ______ and sprite
Could they all their charms unite
Ne’er should win the witching power
Love has given you for dower.
Though they post on every breeze,
Dive beneath the tropic seas,
Though in cave and mountain peak
Far they roam and long they seek
All they’ll win by force of stealth
Were a trifle to the wealth
Of that secret inner world

A little child shall lead them 151
That within your smile is curled.
Yours is not a conscious art;
’Tis the wild magic of your heart.
You but speak a simple word
Often said and often heard
When before my wondering eyes
An unveiled Paradise
Bursts about me into flower.
Here each nimble-footed hour
Daft with all the fun that’s in it
Dances like a madcap minute.
All the earth in light enfolden
Seems a chamber green and golden
Dight for love’s festivities;
And a thousand harmonics
Softer sweeter more endeared
Than my heart had ever heard
Gush from every bank and rise
Fill the woods and touch the skies.
Wind and cloud and leaf and stream
Notes of purest music seem
And all Nature like a choir
Tuned to the sun-God’s lyre
In new hymns of jubilee
Chants her ancient ecstasy.
Yet the flowing cup of bliss
Holds more precious wine than this.
Our sweet rapture did but screen
Brighter glories yet unseen;
’Twas a distant fragrance blown
From a Garden yet unknown.
Love has pierced the mystery
Hid within the prophecy
Of the heavenly poets who said
‘By a child shall they be led,’
‘From a babe is wisdom gained
From the weak is strength ordained.’
152 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
By some mightier miracle
Than any feigne’d charm or spell
A little smiling newborn boy
In his gift will hold more joy
Open glimpses of a heaven
More remote from earth than even
That enchanted land we knew
Where all fairy-tales came true.
Now when e’er I gaze upon
This my loved and loving son,
When beside his bed I keep
Watcho’er his elysian sleep
When I fold him in my arms
Nestling safe from all alarms
Or behold his innocence
With a sinner’s reverence—
Lo, an infinite high hope
On my longing ‘gins to ope!
With this tiny hand to guide
We will leave the cold earth’s side
And faring far and far away
Beyond the springs of night and day
Will travel to the end the road
That bears all lovers up to God.
Envoy
BE of good cheer!
What but the glory of the Light of Light
Could cast such shadows on a world forlorn?
If our hearts whispered not the hope of morn
Would we so hate the horror of his night?
What is it else than desperate bitter fear
That drives the troops of evil, who know well
Their hour is come, to vent their dying rage
Upon the people of this heaven-lit age
And seek by every means they may to sell
Their lost dominion dear?
Be of good cheer!
The very depth of our perplexity
Amid this whirling world of strife and care
Where disillusion beckons to despair
Is of itself a call for help, a cry
That angels’ hearts will not be slow to hear.
For it is ever in such a time as ours,
When man has ransacked sea and land for rest
And never sought the heaven in his own breast,
That God reveals once more His hidden powers
And in His might draws near.
Be of good cheer!
Though all things change, Truth’s kingdom is secure.
The forms of faith come, go, and are forgot,
But that which they enshrine can perish not.
Altars may crumble, worship will endure.
Those holy things that God bids man revere
Reign on unchecked by man’s satanic will;
Wisdom and love are of a higher birth
Than these frail phantom forces of the earth
And take their deathless power from Him who still
Above all change stands clear.

154 The Mission of Bahá’u’lláh
Be of good cheer!
What kings desired in vain God gives to you
And in this wondrous day before our eyes
Unseals His ancient book of mysteries
Making all things in earth and heaven new.
Truth hath come down from some far flaming sphere;
Lo, in our midst her sacred fires burn!
And see—trace back these countless rays of light
To the One Point wherein they all unite,
And bow your forehead in the dust to learn
That God Himself is here!

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