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[Page 401]

WORLD ORDER

Copyright 1937 by BAHÁ’Í PUBLISHING COMMITTEE.

FEBRUARY 1937

NUMBER 11 VOLUME 2

CIVILIZATIONS ALSO DIE

EDITORIAL

EVERY form of existence in the visible universe forms part of an organism, and its life is maintained through functions which contribute to the larger aims of that organism. The same law by which the earth receives vital energy from the sun binds the earth within its fixed orbit. No form of existence maintains itself alone.

But while the organisms or patterns of nature do not reveal fundamental change, the systems or patterns of every human society are subject to continuous development. The life of the bee, the wasp or the forest is a pattern which eternally repeats, except only for that minor adaptation required by changes in its environment. We do not look for improved beehives or more ingenius birds’ nests from year to year.

In the light of the larger measure of consciousness permeating the human race in this age it is possible to perceive clearly how completely the individual man is gathered up within his social organism, how profoundly his existence fulfills itself as a function of his society, how intimately his life and that of the society are interdependent. As self-consciousness widens to include true recognition of conditions outside himself, the modern man can impersonally realize that, like the planet, the bee or the animal, he is a unitary function of a pattern transcending himself.

The first social law is that civilization continuously undergoes development, unlike the constancy of the patterns found in nature. A society possesses the characteristics of a living organism, a form of reality which cannot be limited to the qualities of its individual men and women. A society is strong to the degree that it inspires the loyalty of all its members, and fulfills each, not merely economically and physically, but also ethically and spiritually, by upholding aims and purposes which enlarge the capacity and experience of all contributing to their realization. The highest form of social progress is that which proceeds from physical, or economic ideals, to ideals summoning the utmost resources of mind and [Page 402] heart.

The second law of society is that a civilization, apart from the physical survival of its members, can and does perish when its collective energies are spent. From the hour that loyalty to the community begins to transform itself into self-loyalty—reduced to the instinct for survival struggling against the individual’s fellows—the society, whether a small, local community or a vast empire, undergoes rapid disintegration. From that point to the end, the effort to command or coerce that full loyalty originally voluntary and inspired is completely unsuccessful. Even though armies and police reinforce the effort, the life of the organism cannot be maintained beyond its day of destiny. The very development of coercive power for the purpose of assuring loyalty is a fatal evidence of the death-struggle by which the organism has been assailed.

Not otherwise can be explained the struggles which now torment every national society existing upon earth. They represent nothing more than a final stage in the collapse of a spiritual culture which once transcended nationalism; they are the means by which a civilization destroys itself once its organic spirit has fled. Thus Christendom divided into nations, thus Islam, before our very gaze, similarly has divided into nations whose enhancement of material power is the sign that faith is dead.

The world of competitive nationalisms in which we now live is a world nearing the end of those separate spiritual cultures which in the past, as religion renewed men’s inspiration through outwardly different Manifestations of God, each supplied the motive and the energy for the rise of a true social organism or civilization. The transformation of society from faith to material power is the eternal principle of life and death applied to the collective existence of mankind.

Nothing on earth can renew the spirit of faith after it has fulfilled its purpose by producing a civilization. Nothing within a dying civilization, neither its government, its schools nor its churches, can resurrect that spirit which came from God alone. The truth that civilizations also die stands high and unchallengable. Until faith is renewed by God through His Manifestation, human beings are helpless. No individual and no group can produce the life of a social organism. That life awaits the return of religion, the quickening of faith, the vital impulse to a loyalty that is supreme because it is loyalty to God.

H.H.

[Page 403]

CREATE A POSITIVE PEACE

By DONALD FAY ROBINSON

IT is useless to attack darkness. You cannot fight it. You cannot pass laws against it. The only thing you can do is to light a lamp. For darkness is not something in itself. It is a nothing, a less than nothing. It is a lack. The only way you can overcome it is to put a something, light, in its place.

It is traditional to speak of evil as darkness. We are all familiar with the phrase “the powers of darkness.” That is just another way of saying that evil is not something in itself, but a lack. Like darkness it cannot be attacked. All you can do is to put a something, in other words good, in its place.

I think we are all agreed that war is evil. It follows then that we cannot attack it directly and accomplish anything. For in attacking it directly, in preaching against it and trying to outlaw it by treaty, we are merely fighting with shadows. Instead we must set up a real thing such that war will automatically cease to exist. We must create a positive peace that shall destroy war as utterly as light destroys darkness.

The roots from which war grows are greed and fear. Nations go to war to gain something they value or for fear that they will lose what they value to someone else. But no one can take from another what he already has himself. In other words, greed and fear grow out of the lack or the possibility of the lack of the things that men hold dear. Obviously, then, the way to eliminate war is to eliminate the possibility of that lack. The way to eliminate war is to create plenty, abundance, to flood the earth with the things that men and women desire.

No darkness is wholly without light. So long as there is a ray of light in the universe, total darkness does not exist. And there is always light even in the blackest darkness. In just the same way no war is altogether evil. You will hear advocates of war declaring that war brings out the noblest qualities in men and women. And to a great extent this is true. But more light does not destroy the light that was already there. It [Page 404] reinforces it. Neither would the elimination of war destroy the nobility of the human race. It would increase it.

A war gives to the men and women of a nation the chance to work together towards a common goal. They are forced by bitter circumstances to subordinate their little selves to something bigger than they are, and they are linked together by a danger that threatens them all. They are forced quite literally to lay down their lives for their loved ones, in honor preferring one another. And for those whose natures are capable of nobility this may seem a high privilege and give ecstatic joy.

But war in itself is evil. And though nobility is never displayed in vain, though self-sacrifice can never be wholly wasted, yet they are robbed of their greatest power for good when evil bestrides the earth. It is far better that human beings should have a wholly constructive goal for which they can strive. It is far better that they should band together for the creation of abundance. So they will be heaping wood on the fire whose light shall at last banish the darkness of war from the face of the earth.

THE things that men want are many and varied and not all of them can be produced in abundance. But those things that are by their very nature limited in quantity are also limited in their appeal. On the other hand, the things that all of us want are not by nature limited. With our modern machinery we can produce as much food and clothing, as many houses, automobiles and radios as the human race can use. If we would but band together, setting the permanent good of the whole ahead of a temporary benefit to the few, we could have an almost unlimited abundance of them.

The same is true of immaterial things. Some are limited. But those that all men want, like health, knowledge and affection, are by nature unlimited and may be made abundant. One person’s health and knowledge and the affection given him do not hinder another having health, knowledge and affection. On the contrary they increase the chances of that other obtaining them.

None of these things, however, are the final goal of human activity. Food and clothing, automobiles and radios, even health, knowledge and affection are sought by human beings not as ends in themselves but because they lead to a higher goal, that peace of soul which is called happiness. Of all the things men want, this, the most universal and the most desired, is by nature the least liable to limitation. For happiness is a spiritual and personal thing, a thing that exists in the human heart where no thief can come and no rust or moth consume. It is something which all men could have in abundance, a thing like fire that spreads from heart to heart. When the means of achieving happiness is wholly positive and constructive, one man’s attainment of it brings all that know him one step nearer to attaining it themselves. For that peace of soul which we call happiness is in its fullness divine and infinite and eternal.

[Page 405] Even in war it is happiness that is sought. But the happiness so gained is vitiated by misery because the means used is destructive. If we are to combat war with any hope of success, we must offer mankind a means of achieving happiness which does not involve the unhappiness of others. We must make it possible for all men to seek happiness through those things which are by their nature unlimited. Only so can conflict be eliminated from human life.

The roots from which war grows are greed and fear. But one special form of greed and one special form of fear are more likely than the rest to result in war. These are the greed for power over other people and the fear of insecurity.

Of these the less fundamental is the greed for power over other people. In the first place, it is only the one here and the one there that is beset by it. It is not a universal desire. In the second place, it cannot be satisfied except with the initial consent of the other people involved. One man can achieve power over other people only by playing on a greed for things or on the fear of insecurity among the masses. It follows, therefore, that if the masses have an abundance of the things they desire and a firm-set sense of security, then the man with a greed for power is deprived of the material wherewith to satisfy his greed. For if the masses are satisfied and feel secure, they will have nothing to gain by submitting to autocratic authority.

If we are to eliminate war, then, we must not only create abundance; we must also create a sense of security among all mankind. For without this sense of security the fear of the possibility of lack remains lurking in the human consciousness. Without this sense of security war remains an ever-present possibility.

A SENSE of security among men cannot exist unless each man trusts his fellows, and has a feeling of communion between himself and them. Nothing can give this mutual trust and this feeling of communion like working together for a common goal—cooperation. It is cooperation that gives war what value it has. And this value lies precisely in the sense of communion and mutual trust that binds an embattled nation together. Mutual trust, a sense of communion, a feeling of unyielding security would arise among all mankind if every nation on the earth should cooperate in a common task with every other. And that trust and communion and security can arise from no other source.

It follows, then, that it is not enough to give mankind an abundance of the things he wants. It is conceivably possible that a group of human beings might get together and provide their fellow men with all their needs. But that would not eliminate conflict. Rather we must make it possible for men, all men, to work together, in full consciousness of each other, for the production of their own abundance. We must reorganize our entire social and economic structure in such fashion that the whole human race may work together, equals in a common task, to flood the earth with plenty.

[Page 406] THIS is no easy task. It demands the sacrifice of temporary and personal benefits. It demands that we make it the undeviating principle of our lives to give rather than to take, that we concentrate all our efforts not on getting things but on producing them. It does not demand that we die for our fellowmen. But it does demand what may be for many a far harder task, that we live for them. Those of us that are wealthy must use that wealth for the good of the whole. Those of us that have skill or knowledge must dedicate that skill and knowledge to the upbuilding of human happiness. In the end the seed which we so cast into the ground will return to us an hundredfold increased. But we must set all men ahead of one man, the human race ahead of our individual selves, the ultimate good ahead of the temporary benefit, if we are to reap that harvest. We must all subordinate our little selves to something bigger than we are, in honor preferring one another, not as members of a nation but as members of humanity. Then in very fact will war vanish from the earth like night in the face of the sun.

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PRAYER

By DIANTHA CRISP

Oh Thou Blessed Perfection

This . . . is our Plea:

Teach us . . .

By Thy Wisdom

To learn the Unknown Things;

Teach us . . .

By Thy Light

To let our spirit shine;

Teach us . . .

By Thy great Compassion

To shut out none from Kindliness;

Teach us . . .

By Thy utter Realization

To fulfill our capacities.

[Page 407]

TRUE ENTHUSIASMS

By ALFRED E. LUNT

INNATE in the nature of man reposes an impelling need of hero worship. And this is essentially the longing of the human heart to discover an individualized perfection, and to adore it. The man, or woman, who, in the eyes of the seeker of human perfections, seems to embody those qualities of brilliant leadership for which he longs, is promptly clothed in the glistening armor of a Galahad, and, in the mind of his worshipper, every human defect is obliterated. His character, wisdom and courage are regarded as of unblemished excellence; indeed, in the eyes of his beholder, he takes on the attributes of an infallibility well nigh sovereign in its nature.

This human weakness,—for its consequences have often been disastrous, —is attributable to the tendency of the masses to assess the value of a prominent figure in public life by a mere surface yardstick. Their analysis of his qualifications, his grasp of the deeper currents of life, rarely penetrates beneath the surface. Energy and action, the emotional appeal of a personality engaged in increasing warfare with antagonistic forces, tend to quiet natural apprehensions and to concentrate the full power of mass mentality upon the struggle itself, and their supposed champion.

The remote consequences of the triumph of the policies projected by their idol are, frequently, entirely lost sight of. Action rather than principles, form the horizon of human thought in such circumstances. The future is left to its fate; the present is the sole desideratum. Thus, for example, if an unwise physician, in the face of alarming symptoms of his patient, administers a powerful medicine which quiets the distress and conveys a temporary sense of recovery and well being, the patient is grateful, little realizing that, presently, the harmful ingredients of the medicine are certain to engulf him into an illness far worse than before. The patient can, of course, hardly be blamed for this ignorance of medical science, but when this failure of analytical power uncovers itself in the [Page 408] political and social life of mankind, acting as an anesthetic to quiet and lull a large group of citizens from intelligent exercise of their suffrage, a deadly blow is dealt to free institutions.

These views are, of course, applicable to every nation democratically governed, and without special reference to any particular country. On this ladder, dictators ascend, and peoples are stripped of dearly won liberties. These adorations of a human personality, apart from the exercise and blessings of true consultation, are to be numbered, with rare if any exceptions, in the category of false enthusiasms.

The emotional nature of man is largely responsible for this undoubted slowing down of human evolution. These baneful episodes in government, are like a brake applied to the advancing chariot of human affairs and progress.

But this emotion merely gives vent to that deep seated yearning for embodied perfection, inherent in our race. To say that this yearning is divine is but to emphasize that principle of faith and knowledge, assented to by every believer in the divine origin of creation, which affirms the salient proposition that God, the exalted, has placed within His creatures; i.e., man, both the capacity and the desire “to know Him, and to adore Him.”

THIS capacity and desire are identical with the yearning referred to, which, lacking full knowledge of its true goal, ever seeks fulfillment in some human personality. That this yearning is allied to emotion, and that ordinary emotion is disdainful of mere reason and the power of rational analysis, carries the answer to the question,—why does mass sentiment so often mistake its goal, sacrifice its fine energies to the flame of a guttering candle, and visit upon itself the most oppressive shackles? Such happenings, so often repeated in the ebb and flow of human history, illustrate the truth of the saying of Bahá’u’lláh that by such inattention to the Divine Exemplar, who, alone, is worthy of worship and adoration, men become “self-oppressors.” And, again, He informs us— “And when they had forgotten their warnings, We set open to them the gates of all things.” (Gleanings p. 227) These “gates” are the gates of the earth, its allurements and mirages.

Because this emotion which blinds when unfortified by wisdom and the knowledge of reality, is unable to penetrate to the heart of the problems of government and to balance the weaknesses and virtues of the human personality it has exalted, the full flood of that adoration which was meant and destined for God, alone, is poured out upon a fallible human instrument. This false enthusiasm, this hysteria so often bordering on unreason, proves its unsoundness by its purely temporary character. The idol of yesterday becomes the flouted outcast of tomorrow. If this is not always the case, the mad adoration that was his grows into a mere lingering candle-flame. Another leader has captured the adulation of the public.

Except a man has definitely linked [Page 409] himself and his destiny with those universal transactions that are divine in scope, neither his name nor the love of the people for him can ever survive the erasure of time. Conquerors may be remembered for their conquests, but only as exhibitions of power and might and ruthlessness. Love and adoration shun such memories.

Only those personages like Peter, the rock of Christianity, Ali, the spiritual heir of Muhammad, Aaron to whom Moses was the similitude of God, and David, the genius of the Psalms, have retained the love and undying veneration of human hearts. And even they would have unceremoniously rejected that adoration which they well knew was only to God, the Fashioner of all things.

We are living in an age when, for the first time in remembered history, the knowledge and the true relationship of the Unique and Peerless Creator to His creation have been revealed to mankind. Up to this time, confusion has reigned concerning the actual mutual connection between the Prophets and Manifestation of God and that Holy essence. Great schisms have divided the churches and religious systems, hovering between the two horns of the dilemma, —whether the Christ is man, or God, Himself. In practically every case, the choice has fallen upon either one of the two extremes. Those who proclaimed Him to incarnate the Essence of God ignored the references in His own Revelation to His utter dependence upon God, as for instance, His Holiness Christ, who rebuked the people for calling Him “Good Master,” saying to them that “there is none good save God.” And, on the other hand, that community that affirmed their Prophet to be merely a man, overlooked the majestic pronouncements in which He had definitely placed Himself in the category of divinity, itself. The one had, unwittingly, divided the God-head into a pantheistic plurality; the other had denied to the station of Manifestation its divine vicegerency.

IN the midst of this confusion, the true balance has been now constructed and revealed to the world by Bahá’u’lláh’s Supreme Pen. This is a teaching of reality that, with one breath, clears the ancient fog of superstition that has so long rendered men purblind. This ray of the Sun of Truth has pierced the thick veil that had intervened between men and the Orb of Reality. With irrefutable proof, He, Bahá’u’lláh, has reconciled and accounted for the two conflicting view-points. In performing this great service for humanity, He has, first of all, demonstrated that the unknowable Essence, God, the Divine Being, “is immensely exalted beyond every human attribute,” “Far be it from His Glory that human tongue should adequately recount His praise, or that human heart comprehend His fathomless mystery. He is and hath ever been veiled in the ancient eternity of His Essence, and will remain in His Reality everlastingly hidden from the sight of men.” (Gleanings, pp. 46, 47)

In this description, no room remains for the least trace of pantheism. Corporeal existence, ascent and [Page 410] descent, egress and regress are alike rejected and transcended by the Ancient of Days. And since the knowledge of His Essence is thus impossible to all beings, He has revealed what is needful, through His Grace, to “those luminous Gems of Holiness whom He” has caused to appear (among men) “out of the realm of the spirit in the noble form of the human temple—that they may impart unto the world the mysteries of the unchangeable Being, and tell of the subtleties of His imperishable Essence.” (Gleanings p. 47)

Here we witness the true grandeur of the Manifestations of God. Illumined by His Words that “these Tabernacles of Holiness, these Primal Mirrors which reflect the light of unfading glory, are but expressions of Him who is the Invisible of the Invisibles;” that “by the revelation of these Gems of Divine virtue all the names and attributes of God, such as knowledge and power, sovereignty and dominion, mercy and wisdom, glory, beauty and grace, are made manifest (to men),” (Gleanings p. 48),—it is impossible to suppose that men’s minds can continue, for any long space of time, to be bewildered by the old perplexities. With so holy and unique a status assigned to the authentic Prophets, those who have limited their station to the merely human degree will come to know that, in so doing, they were, in imagination, severing from these Holy Personages, (the Prophets), that divine nimbus which distinguishes them above all men. Such a philosophy fails to recognize in the Christ the investment of that stainless and mighty characteristic, the Word of God, or admit that in Him is focused the all embracing love and power of the Holy Spirit. Just as gold is known by its chemical qualities and weight, so the Manifestation of God is marked out from other men by these all powerful qualities and gifts. To none other than these resplendent, sovereign Messengers of the King of Kings has He granted these transcendent powers. This glory, and this unlimited power to serve the world of humanity remains unimpaired by whatever men may think or conjecture.

Moreover, from the other extremity, that religious philosophy that has failed to differentiate on the one hand, between the Holy and Unknowable Essence of Divinity and on the other, the inviolable and noble human temples of the Manifestations have erred grievously. As previously pointed out, this conception has tended to establish pantheism in the Most Holy Court. The pantheistic philosophy affirms that the creation is impregnated with the Divine Essence, as the branch or fruit on the tree. This necessarily implies that the soul of man is a part of that Essence. From this inevitably follows the postulate that the world or universe of creation is made up of countless potential gods. Those, however, who are responsible for this philosophy, in the strictly religious sense, would limit this view to the domain of the Christ, and would be the first to deny that it extended to and included any other created being. But a breach of this significant character, once made in the ramparts of religion, cannot be [Page 411] dogmatically forbidden to bar the inclusion of man, himself. It constitutes what may be called the “fatal admission” and opens wide the doors to a perilous repudiation of this most sacred Law by which the Almighty has bound His creation.

THE divine creation, Bahá’u’lláh explains, is a process of emanation, not of manifestation. Not the fruit on the tree, but the books of the writer, the sculpture from the finger of the artist, the mirror reflecting the orb of the sun according to its capacity, constitute the oneness of the design of the creation of God. Every living thing is the depository of one of His Signs,—while man has been given the capacity to show forth all the Divine perfections. The oneness of the entire creation, the oneness of all mankind, spring from this uniformity of design, since all are capable of mirroring forth one or more of the Divine attributes. This is the basic unity, and this exists within its own ordained laws, as an emanation of the Divine Author of its being. He, the Sun of Reality, has not imparted to it of His Unfathomable Essence. But upon the resplendent mirror of His creation, He has reflected the glory of His Perfections and endowed each of the beings with a living reality.

It is evident, then, that the Prophet of God, the eternal Christ, is the most perfect Mirror of that Ancient Essence. He is perfect in manhood and in the divine station, alike. So wondrous are the outpourings of Grace upon Him that He is, indeed, self-luminous. He utters the Word of God, and reveals the Love of God. His deeds and life manifest to the fullest the perfections of God. “These Countenances are the recipients of the Divine Command, and the Day Springs of His Revelation.” (Gleanings p. 51). The voice of Divinity is heard from Their tongues. It is They who promulgate the Divine Law, and summon the people to that order, happiness and welfare which the Merciful One has destined for them. It is They who unlock the mysteries of the Kingdom, and “lay bare those gems that lie hidden within the mine of their (men’s) true and inmost selves.” (Gleanings p. 287).

The true enthusiasm of mankind can never find satisfaction save in directing its highest emotion, its utmost soul-flight, its quest for reality —to the Prophet of the age. Nothing short of this can fulfill the divine requirement. “O Son of Spirit! There is no peace for thee save by renouncing thyself and turning unto Me; for it behoveth thee to glory in My Name, not in thine own; to put thy trust in Me and not in thyself, since I desire to be loved alone and above all that is.” (Hidden Words, Arabic, p. 8).

This kind of enthusiasm has been reserved by God for Himself. And because the way to His Essence is barred, and He has clothed His Messengers with the Messianic power, and ordained that They shall be to mankind even as Himself, as pure and primal Mirrors of His Reality,— the recognition of the appearance of the Prophet of the age opens the gates for the outpouring of that hidden [Page 412] yearning in the breast of man to adore and follow the true, divine Hero. He alone is worthy of this love and complete trust. The Ancient Friend loves us for our own sakes and not because of some hoped for political or other preferment.

The call of God in this age is to turn away from this unthinking, blind following of earthly leaders to the real Leader of mankind. This age marks the setting up of the Kingdom of God, and all eyes must be upon the King. He is the Standard. His administrative order has provided for all necessary, minor allegiances. The Houses established under this Law are governed and controlled by His all embracing Principles.

In the face of this heavenly organization, or rather, organism,— the adulation of political leaders, which has perverted the real hero worship in man for so many ages, instilled into him so often the spirit of combat and fury, and cemented all his hopes upon a fallible human leader, is seen to be a kind of idol worship that holds man in bondage. Much of his heaven born energy, his innate spirit of worship loses and wastes itself in this vain pursuit. The spirit of partisanship tends to separate him from his fellow man, and to erect deep seated divisions in human society. These baubles that savor of the age of immaturity are certain to be exploded by the penetrating shafts of the Divine reality which has now uncovered to every eye the Goal of every true enthusiasm. Human leaders will come to know that only he whose deeds and words conform to the Heavenly Standard can hope to merit the approval of the public, and that, at best, he is but a reflection of that unfettered adoration that belongs only to the Manifestation of God.

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IT is clear that the reality of mankind is diverse, that opinions are various and sentiments different; and this difference of opinions, of thoughts, of intelligence, of sentiments among the human species, arises from essential necessity; for the differences in the degrees of existence of creatures is one of the necessities of existence, which unfolds itself in infinite forms. Therefore we have need of a general power which may dominate the sentiments, the opinions, and the thoughts of all, thanks to which these divisions may no longer have effect, and all individuals may be brought under the influence of the unity of the world of humanity. It is clear and evidence that this greatest power in the human world is the love of God. It brings the different peoples under the shadow of the tent of affection; it gives to the antagonistic and hostile nations and families the greatest love and union.—‘Abdu’l-Bahá.

[Page 413]

SEVEN CANDLES OF UNITY

A Symposium

V. UNITY IN RELIGION

By DOROTHY BAKER

BAHÁ’U’LLÁH has said, “Through each and every one of the verses which the Pen of the Most High hath revealed, the doors of love and unity have been unlocked and flung open to the face of men. . . Consort with the followers of all religions in a spirit of friendliness and fellowship.”

Is unity of faith possible? Consider how variously man conceives of God. Spinoza and Haeckel believed that mind and matter were one and constituted the entire universe. They did not recognize a God or a supreme Being. Herbert Spencer was a representative of the Agnostic school which teaches that we will never entirely know, but leaves the doors of belief open. Deism is the belief that God made the world and after the creation stood aside to let it take care of its own destiny. Pantheism is the belief that God is the universe; that He is everything and everything is God. If God had no restraining purpose in the matter we should have eventually as many ideas of Him as there are human minds.

Yet unity of faiths, most fundamental of Bahá’í precepts, has become a necessity of our time, not for its own sake alone, but for its motivating power in world affairs. Any movement toward peace, for example, which fails in this major adjustment is like a body without a heart or an engine without a motor, able to be pushed in a given direction by stress of circumstance, but devoid of natural motivation from within itself. H. G. Wells, in a recent article entitled “The Next War” writes, “In short we want a new practical world religion whose declared objective is a federated world.” He suggests a bit laconically, then, the possible resurrection of Buddhism or Christianity, but prefers the term liberalism to meet the need.

The fact that liberalism has had a devastating rather than a uniting effect upon religion itself, however, throws some doubt upon whether [Page 414] such levity, even possessed of a great goal, could motivate human harmony in general, and more especially establish a common passion of faith.

The first great adventure of America was her escape from spiritual tyranny. If our forefathers had one high resolve in common above all others it was that they might worship in freedom. Our anxious pendulum swung to a strange extreme and demanded rigorous conformity to the new. We passed through days of expulsion, blue laws and Salem witchcraft and attained a new high in bigotry and intolerance. Then came the reaction. Robert Ingersoll rebelled and preached agnostically because he could not truthfully endorse the ecclesiastical absurdities of his day. Wild fire does not spread faster than did his doctrine, but all did not go the way of the agnostic. The spiritually sensitive reached out and caught the spirit of a new age and translated it according to their type and kind. Theosophy, Christian Science, New Thought, Metaphysics, these and a hundred others offered food to the hungry and the people ate, at first with raised eyebrows and then with frank appetite. Then the churches and philosophies alike divided and sub-divided until at last our very freedom became a nightmare. The ship of humanity seemed to have lost its rudder; assurance was wholly lacking. What could one believe and why should he believe it? It became something of the style of the day to ask, “If Jesus came into the world today, which Christian group would he endorse?” And none could answer. Liberalism had not united religious America.

The Christian world was not alone afflicted. Schism had rent older and younger faiths. The Orthodox and the Reformed Jew, the Sunni and the Shiah Moslem testified alike to the same problem. To what sect of Islam would Muhammad subscribe? To which school of Jewish faith would Moses profess loyalty? So in spite of the stark necessity of great undersweeps of spiritual harmony in the race, we are still asking, “Is unity of faiths possible?”

The finest flower of ecclesiastical and philosophic thought has failed in its most valiant attempts to draw the heart-strings of humanity together into religious unity. Prophethood alone has succeeded. Grecian philosophers, giants in their pygmied world of mythical lore, failed to accomplish it for the ancient world. But over in Rome and throughout Syria a handful of humble disciples of Jesus of Nazareth were doing just that. They were making Syrian, Greek and Roman, Mithraist and Jew know first that they were Christian. The soothsayers of Pharaoh’s court and all of his wise men failed to hold the common people to a unity of worship, but Moses arose and led a whole people through a wilderness of doubt and unbelief. Where does such a basis of unity begin? Where indeed but with God, who is One; whose Word is One; and whose Cause is One Cause throughout ages and cycles.

REVEALED religion is truth restated according to new needs and evolving capacities. The source of [Page 415] faith is the Word of God or Logos, which appears as rhythmically as the spring season, as rhythmically in fact, as every natural phenomenon appears. “Once in about a thousand years,” writes Bahá’u’lláh, “the City of Certitude is renewed and re-adorned.” The Word is an Act of God by which we are assured that He never leaves us to ourselves indefinitely, but rather guides our evolution with precise and intelligent care. Bahá’u’lláh has renewed the City of Assurance for the entire believing world and has made it a “valley for My flocks to lie down in.” This is the true foundation for peace. As for beliefs, it is possible that we shall never unite the philosophies and it would seem unnecessary that we do. Bahá’u’lláh seeks merely to bring into a single and continuous pattern the revealed religions founded on prophetic utterance, and to consummate that for which they were given.

History has not always helped in unveiling Truth, for history lies for the most part buried. Civilizations rising and falling leave not one stone upon another to prove the continuous bounty of Prophethood.

“The Daysprings of eternal holiness,” writes Bahá’u’lláh of these Arch-types, the major Prophets, “have been sent down from time immemorial and been commissioned to summon mankind to the one true God. That the names of some of them are forgotten and records of their lives lost is to be attributed to the disturbances and changes that have overtaken the world.”

Present day students of comparative religion have, however, contributed much to the immediate realization of this unity, for the revealed religions are fast coming to be recognized as co-sharers of beauty, of fundamental truths, and of sacrifice.

“The old notion,” writes Alfred Martin, “that there are moral precepts in the New Testament not to be matched in one or another of the non-Christian Bibles is now known to be a mistake. When some bumptious individual in 1879 at a great meeting in Boston declared that certain Gospel passages which he quoted could not be paralleled anywhere else, Ralph Waldo Emerson, who happened to be in the audience, arose and with that sublime, serene, ethereal manner always characteristic of his utterances, suggested that ‘the gentleman’s remark only proved how narrowly he had read’.” Corresponding limitations, Mr. Martin assures us, are to be found among other religionists, who, like Ameer Seyd Ali in his book, “Mohammed and Islam,” seek to exploit their own faith while minimizing the beauty of others.

Strikingly similar are the truths that the revealed religions have taught. In his book, “Great Religions of the World,” Mr. Martin asserts that the seven great religions extant in the world today, in spite of the ravages of time and theology upon each, express almost equally four great verities. First there is the adoration of a Deity whose Name appears variously as Yahveh, Om, Aton, God or Allah. Second is found a definite call to brotherhood and love. A promise of immortality is the third, and fourth we find golden rules so [Page 416] identical as to be truly astonishing. Separated by thousands of miles and sometimes by thousands of years, this code of living appears in scriptures apparently foreign one to the other:

“The true rule,” writes the Hindu, “is to regard and do by the things of others as they do by their own.”

“One should seek for others the happiness one desires for himself,” says the Buddhist.

Zoroastrian scripture proclaims, “Do as you would be done by.”

“What you do not wish done to yourself,” says the Chinese rule, “Do not do unto others.”

Muhammadan writings state, “Let none of you treat your brother in a way he himself would dislike to be treated.”

Jewish scripture teaches, “What ever you do not wish your neighbor to do to you, do not unto him.”

And the Christian, “All things whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them.”

The most amazing likeness of all is the belief in the divinity of the Christ. To be sure, the name of that divine Beauty has changed again and again as it has appeared in one selected human vehicle and then another, but traditional repetition establishes one consistent story. George Dorsey writes, “Osiris, for example, was born December 27 and traveled about; was supreme king; taught civil arts, music, gentleness . . . Was betrayed by Typhon, prince of darkness; was slain and dismembered; was placed in a coffin and came to life. His passion or mystery play— suffering death and resurrection— was enacted at Abydos. The Hindu Krishna’s birth was announced by a star; he performed miracles; raised the dead; healed lepers, deaf and blind; championed the poor and oppressed; had a beloved disciple Arjuna (John); was crucified on a tree or shot by an arrow. Mithra was born December twenty-first in a cave of a virgin; traveled as a teacher and illuminator; had twelve companions or disciples; was buried and rose from a tomb; his resurrection was yearly celebrated; was called ‘Savior’ or ‘Mediator’.”

SO speaks the historian of these and a score of others, and he is borne out by a passage from the seventh chapter of the Book of Hebrews: “For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of God Most High . . . without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like unto the Son of God, abideth a priest continually.” The story in its real significance could be extended to Jesus, Zoroaster, Muhammad, Laotze and Moses, for if Melchizedek, the physical man, were “without beginning of days or end of life,” he would have even yet been standing among them, and had he, the man, been without father or mother, he could not have existed. Therefore it is plain that the Christ Spirit within Melchizedek, born not of man but of God, was that extolled Beloved in Melchizedek, as in other Revelators. It is this same Spirit of God which is resurrected to appear again when the people have need of it. It is of this Divine Word or [Page 417] Christ within him that Jesus spoke when he said, “Before Abraham was, I am.” This one spirit, constituting the central point of unity in the Revealed Religions, has appeared again in Bahá’u’lláh.

Moreover, the bearers of revealed Truth share in common the most tragic sacrifice. The greatest pageantry in history is the endless procession of those persecuted luminaries who, anointed with the spirit of God, accept all suffering for the sake of bringing men again into assured faith. In “Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh” are to be found these remarkable words: “At one time Thou didst deliver Me into the hands of Nimrod; at another Thou hast allowed Pharaoh’s rod to persecute me . . . Again Thou didst cast me into the prison cell of the ungodly . . . And again Thou didst decree that I be beheaded by the sword of the infidel. Again, I was crucified for having unveiled to men’s eyes the hidden gems of Thy glorious unity . . .” Here is a passion play indeed! The Spirit of God, the living Christ, the Lamb that was slain from the foundation of the world, not satisfied to be once slain, gives itself again and again to be despised. The undying affection of God for men seems never to evoke a hasty gratitude, but unthanked, His passion continues, single in origin; one in sacrifice; showing forth a unity that none can fail to see.

Unity of faith is possible. Not only has the science of comparative religion proved the basic harmony of revealed Truth, but God has again renewed it. To dare reasonably to hope for religious unity rests not alone on full acknowledgment of the likenesses of religions past, but also upon recognition of the Word revealed today in its full power to succeed where men have failed. No force less than the Spirit of God can now effect a healing for our disintegration.

Who indeed but God could today bring order out of chaos? A Moses to lead us out of our wilderness; a Jesus to restore us to the law of love; a Muhammad to teach us obedience to divine decree! In the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh God speaks again; creation trembles; resists; is at last reborn. Differences lose their sting and are forgotten in a common faith, a new social urge and a wholehearted obedience to Revealed Will. In the heaven of that Will, and only there, lies enshrined the secret of the unity of the world.

[Page 418]

YOUTH LOOKS AHEAD

By MARGUERITE L. REIMER

In a recent radio address the President spoke to the Youth of America saying “. . . dream dreams and see visions about a greater and finer America that is to be . . . believe that poverty can be greatly lessened, that the disgrace of involuntary unemployment can be wiped out, that the class hatreds can be done away with, that peace at home and abroad can be maintained, . . . If that is the fashioning of your dreaming then I say: Hold fast to your dreams.”

Undoubtedly large numbers of all ages heard or read these same words and thought how grand to dream and see visions of an America with those qualities. . . . The dreaming process then begins, but sooner or later the stark realism of the fact faces them: How are these things to be brought about? What methods are to be used? Is Youth to sit back indolently until this fulfilled dream is placed in his lap on a silver platter? These are the questions we must provoke in the minds of Youth! The sooner Youth starts to think along these lines, the sooner will Youth seek the solution.

The first measuring rod we use in our process of looking forward is the experiences and the results of the experiences of the past. Let us look back with an unbiased and unprejudiced mind: the shock, however great, will be that Youth has been following so closely the footsteps of the past generations that Youth could not look ahead to investigate the course upon which it was being lead. We have been living in a “line of least resistance” routine—of having others do our thinking for us, making our plans for us, laying out our lives for us—from a pattern time-worn and shredded by misuse. If we don’t soon try to stand on our own feet, the time will come when we will be too weak to follow from our own power. If we continue to follow in the path of the past, it is evident that the calamities, disturbances, and unrest of the present will have to continue. We have been led to a present of divisions, calamities, and chaotic events —leading to what? Is it logical to believe that by continuing down the time-worn path of the past, we can [Page 419] do what others could not? Let us step off that well-worn path trod by past generations—what have we to look forward to then? Can we depend upon arriving at a satisfactory conclusion, that of unity, peace, and harmony?

All of the knowledge possessed by man has been given him through the mouth-pieces of God, the prophets. At one time, the prophet was Moses; at another, Zoroaster; at another, Buddha; then Jesus the Christ; then Muhammad. When each one of these men appeared, it was at a time similar to this, when mankind was at a very low ebb. He would bring a teaching for mankind to follow. Mankind would follow it for a time, then infuse his own ideas and conceptions into these teachings, so bringing about discord and division. Mankind would then again begin to fall until, through the grace of God, another prophet would again appear, rejuvenating and revitalizing the world. Although each of these men brought a message to the entire world, because of poor transportation and meager communication the message could only spread very slowly. By the time the message of one prophet reached the people who still followed another and previous prophet, this newer teaching was so corrupt and perverted with manmade interpretations that instead of recognizing both as alike, each held fast to his own and thought it to be the one and only true teaching.

There was a time when we began to tolerate people, believing in teachings called something different from ours. Then we began to look into these various teachings, and the deeper we looked the more they became as one, until we arrived at the conclusion that they were inspired by the same force. The next fact made apparent to us was that the teachings were divided into two parts, one part taking into consideration the spiritual life of man and the other taking into consideration the material life of man. Here we realized that the two parts were not a repetition, only the one. The spiritual teachings sent to man always have been and always will be the same, but the material teachings were given in direct proportion to the needs and capacities of the people to whom the prophet spoke.

If the knowledge possessed by man came through a mouth-piece of God, where did we get these facts? Are they from the Christian Era, and just coming to light after it is divided into almost numberless sects, and after 2,000 years? Is it from the Muhammadan Era, or from some ancient philosophy long forgotten? Bahá’ís believe that another mouth-piece of God came in the form of Bahá’u’lláh, who renewed the spiritual message for humanity, and brought a material message in proportion to the needs and capacities of the people. Today, however, news travels with such rapidity that although less than fifty years have elapsed since the passing of Bahá’u’lláh, His message is known throughout the entire world.

Students of the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh, looking back upon the debris of the past years can see, emerging from what to some looks to be [Page 420] bur a rotting mass, a world order— safe, secure, and livable—where people will “live and let live,” where work will be done in the spirit of service, where each individual will strive to make life more pleasant for all; so making life a source of joy rather than a span of years forced upon us between the periods of physical birth and death.

Just as the stars, the moon, and the sun move about in their respective orbits, guided by a universal law, so humanity is guided by a universal law. Each prophet that came to this earth spoke of the One who had come previous to Him, and foretold of the One that was to come after Him. Always, in the appointed place and at the appointed hour, these prophecies were fulfilled. Regardless of how man might strive, his efforts to upset the universal law guiding the heavenly bodies would be futile. Likewise, the opposition and discord placed before the Cause of God will be of no avail. As surely as the sun will rise tomorrow, will man be guided onto the right path. The recognition of the prophet in the day in which He appears is the first important factor, following his principles is the second.

IT is easy to see that whatever affects one country today affects all countries. The foremost principle of the Bahá’í Faith is the Oneness of Mankind. It is around this principle that all the others revolve. It is applicable to the individual, but more important it concerns itself with uniting all individuals into members of one human family. Truth being one, the independent investigation of truth would necessarily lead to all humanity arriving at one conclusion. In principles so broad in scope as to take into consideration every need of man from universal education, through racial amity, and the reconciliation between science and religion, to an international Tribunal and Universal Peace, we find every need for man’s future success.

Young Bahá’ís all over the world are becoming, daily, more deeply impressed with the fact that this movement of which we are a part is something vital, growing, alive! It becomes increasingly clearer: The principles are ones to be thought about, lived up to, and proclaimed in all directions and to all peoples. They are the fundamental source of our being here. We must do these things today, and we must start as the time is here and passing. From the “Gleanings” comes the suggestions and admonitions of Bahá’u’lláh: “It behoveth the people of Bahá to die to the world and all that is therein, to be so detached from all earthly things that the inmates of Paradise may inhale from their garment the sweet smelling savor of sanctity, and that all the peoples of the earth may recognize in their faces the brightness of the All-Merciful and that through them may be spread abroad the signs and tokens of God, the Almighty, the All-Wise.”

With these teachings, striving to live them, Youth can step off the outworn path of the past, stop dreaming, and start working to make these principles of the future actualities of today.

[Page 421]

LOVE, THE CREATIVE PRINCIPLE

By ROSA V. WINTERBURN

(Concluded)

ANOTHER selection from the words of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá should not be omitted here, difficult as it is to choose from the many. Speaking of the appearance of the Holy Manifestations of God, and of the “power of the love of God” made manifest through them, He says: “This is the wisdom for the appearance of the Holy Manifestations! When the most great bestowal reveals itself in the hearts of believers, the world of nature will be transformed, the darkness of the contingent being will vanish, and heavenly illumination will be obtained. Then the whole world will become the Paradise of Abhá, every one of the believers of God will become a blessed tree, producing wonderful fruits.

“O ye friends! Fellowship, fellowship! Love, love! Unity, unity!— So that the power of the Bahá’í Cause may appear and become manifest in the world of existence.”

In Hidden Words we are told, “The source of love is to advance to the Beloved and to abandon all else save Him, and to have no hope save in His Will.” Also, “Love Me that I may love thee. If thou lovest Me not, My Love can never reach thee. Know this, O servant!”

So are we shown that love and all of its works proceed from the Infinite; and we are warned that God’s love can not penetrate into our hearts if they are unloving. Therefore, we must learn to love God through the attraction of the magnet of God’s love and by the voluntary exercise of the power of our own will. Thus may man attain to “nearness to God.” After listening in a Christian church to the hymn, “Nearer My God to Thee!” ‘Abdu’l-Bahá said: “Nearness to God is not an easy accomplishment. . . . Divine nearness is dependent upon attainment to the knowledge of God, upon severance from all else save God. It is contingent upon self-sacrifice, and to be found only through forfeiting wealth and worldly possessions (attachment to them and dependence upon them). It is made possible through the baptism [Page 422] of water and fire revealed in the gospels. Water symbolizes the water of life which is knowledge, and fire is the fire of the love of God; therefore man must be baptized with the water of life, the Holy Spirit and the fire of the love of the Kingdom, Until he attains these three degrees, nearness to God is not possible. . . . Nearness to God is dependent upon purity of the heart and exhilaration of the spirit through the glad-tidings of the Kingdom.”

In reality man never becomes discouraged and hopeless except when he is far from God; and, in reality also, he need never fear such remoteness if only he keeps his heart turned toward God and his will alert in the joy and determination to know and love God. This love in his own heart opens wide the door for the entrance of God’s love, bringing safety and power. No matter what the individual capacity and ability may be, the difficulties and the remedies for them will be in accordance with the capacity and ability of the individual himself. In speaking of the various realms of life, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá makes this comparison between the capacity of the animal and the human being:

“But the life of man is not so restricted; it is divine, eternal, not mortal and sensual. For him a spiritual existence and livelihood is prepared and ordained in the divine creative plan. His life is intended to be a life of spiritual enjoyment to which the animal can never attain. This enjoyment depends upon the acquisition of heavenly virtues. The sublimity of man is his attainment of the knowledge of God. The bliss of man is the acquiring of heavenly bestowals which descend upon him in the outflow of the bounty of God. The happiness of man is in the fragrance of the love of God. This is the highest pinnacle of attainment in the human world. How preferable to the animal and its hopeless kingdom!

“Therefore consider how base a nature it reveals in man that notwithstanding the favors showered upon him by God he should lower himself into the animal sphere, be wholly occupied with material needs, attached to this mortal realm, imagining that the greatest happiness is to attain wealth in this world. How purposeless! How debased is such a nature! God has created man in order that he may be a dove of the kingdom, a heavenly candle, a recipient of life eternal. God has created man in order that he may be resuscitated through the breaths of the Holy Spirit and become the light of the world. How debased the soul which can find enjoyment in this darkness, occupied with itself, the captive of self and passion, wallowing in the mire of the material world! How degraded is such a nature! What an ignorance is this! What a blindness! How glorious the station of man who has partaken of the heavenly food and builded the temple of his everlasting residence in the world of heaven!”

Such teachings do not mean that we are not to live joyously in the world in which we have been placed by the act of God. On the contrary, we are constantly led to see that as we have been created material beings [Page 423] in a material world, a part of our mission here is to use, enjoy, develop the material; but it should be so done that the materialism never becomes our master, but remains our servant in the development of a spiritualized material world. Bahá’u’lláh tells us in the Hidden Words: “O My Servants!

“Ye are the trees of My garden; ye must bear fresh and beautiful fruits, that ye and others may be profited by them. Therefore it is necessary for you to engage in arts and business. This is the means of attaining wealth, O ye possessors of intellect. Affairs depend upon means, and the blessing of God will appear therein and will enrich you. Fruitless trees have been and will be only fit for fire.”

Through his human intellect, illumined by the light of spiritual knowledge, man learns something of the force of love in this human world; but he can not imagine what its importance may be in the world of the spirit. Asked to explain something of this, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá likened man in this world to the unborn child: “In the beginning of his human life man was embryonic in the world of the matrix. There he received capacity and endowment for the reality of human existence. The forces and powers necessary for this world were bestowed upon him in that limited condition. In this world he needed eyes; he received them potentially in the other. He needed ears; he obtained them there in readiness and preparation for his new existence . . .

“Therefore in this world he must prepare himself for the life beyond. That which he needs in the world of the kingdom must be obtained here. Just as he prepared himself in the world of the matrix by acquiring forces necessary in this sphere of existence, so likewise the indispensable forces of the divine existence must be potentially attained in this world.”

“That divine world is manifestly a world of lights; therefore man has need of illumination here. That is a world of love; the love of God is essential. It is a world of perfections; virtues or perfections must be acquired. That world is vivified by the breaths of the Holy Spirit; in this world we must seek them. That is the kingdom of life everlasting; it must be attained through this vanishing existence.

“By what means can man acquire these things? How shall he obtain these merciful gifts and powers? First, through the knowledge of God. Second, through the love of God. Third, . . .”

The discourse is far too long to be quoted here. It is so important, however, that every earnest believer should study it frequently and profoundly for himself. Another passage from ‘Abdu’l-Bahá belongs here because of its arresting meaning. To my regret, the words must be given from memory, for I have lost track of them in print. Speaking in the same vein of thought as the above, and in answer to other questions, He said, suppose your faith in this world becomes your eyes in the next world; and your love in this world becomes your speech in the world of the spirit. If here, in this human world, you [Page 424] develop neither your faith nor your love, you must go into the world of the spirit blind to all its beauties, and unable to speak with those around you.

Is not this a most serious warning to us? Our existence in the world of the spirit should not be handicapped by the lack of any of our spiritual senses, and we are told explicitly that these senses must be developed potentially in this material world. That seems to be one of the reasons for our life here. If love corresponds to speech in the spiritual world, who would go there incapable of communicating with those around us? If we are not to be so deprived we must learn in this material world the spiritual love which is far beyond any personal, human passion. No wonder that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá commanded us to “Love, love!”

MAN’S GROWTH THROUGH LOVE

Love is the creative principle. Human love gives man tenderness and strength; and the gifts to man through spiritual love are unknowable. They are measured only by the bounty of God. Growth, progress, fellowship, peace, prosperity, contentment, —these are but a few of the attainments promised those who love in the spirit. The Holy Writings abound with promises.

“Now is the beginning of the manifestation of the power spiritual and inevitably its potency of life forces will assume greater and greater proportions. Therefore this twentieth century is the dawn or beginning of spiritual illumination and it is evident that day by day it will advance. It will reach such a degree that spiritual effulgences will overcome the physical, so that divine susceptibilities will overpower material intelligence and the heavenly light dispel and banish earthly darkness. Divine healing shall purify all ills and the cloud of mercy will pour down its rain. The Sun of Reality will shine and all the earth shall put on its beautiful green carpet. Among the results of the manifestation of spiritual forces will be that the human world will adapt itself to a new social form, the justice of God will become manifest throughout human affairs and human equality will be universally established. . . .

“The essence of the matter is that divine justice will become manifest in human conditions and affairs and all mankind will find comfort and enjoyment in life. It is not meant that all will be equal, for inequality in degree and capacity is a property of nature. . . . There will be an equilibrium of interests, and a condition will be established which will make both rich and poor comfortable and content. This will be an eternal and blessed outcome of the glorious twentieth century which will be realized universally. The significance of it is that the glad-tidings of great joy revealed in the promises of the holy books will be fulfilled. Await ye this consummation.”

“The morals of humanity must undergo change. New remedy and solution for human problems must be adopted. Human intellects themselves must change and be subject to the universal reformation. . . Therefore it is our duty in this radiant century to investigate the essentials of [Page 425] divine religion, seek the realities underlying the oneness of the world of humanity and discover the source of fellowship and agreement which will unite mankind in the heavenly bond of love. This unity is the radiance of eternity, the divine spirituality, the effulgence of God, and the bounty of the kingdom. We must investigate the divine source of these heavenly bestowals and adhere unto them steadfastly. For if we remain fettered and restricted by human inventions and dogmas, day by day the world of mankind will be degraded, day by day warfare and strife will increase, and satanic forces converge toward the destruction of the human race.

“If love and agreement are manifest in a single family, that family will advance, become illumined and spiritual; but if enmity and hatred exist within it destruction and dispersion are inevitable. This is likewise true of a city. Finally this is true of humanity itself in the aggregate. When love is realized and the ideal spiritual bonds unite the hearts of men, the whole human race will be uplifted, the world will continually grow more spiritual and radiant and the happiness and tranquility of mankind be immeasurably increased. . . . . This is the illumination of man, the glory eternal and life everlasting; this is the divine bestowal. . . . . Therefore we must all strive in this pathway of love and service, sacrificing life and possessions, passing our days in devotion, consecrating our efforts wholly to the cause of God, so that, God willing, the ensign of universal religion may be uplifted in the world of mankind and the oneness of the world of humanity be established.”

“The greatest gift of man is universal love, for this love is the magnet which renders existence eternal, attracts reality, and suffuses life with infinite joy. If this love penetrates the heart of man, all the forces of the universe will be realized in him, for it is a divine power which transports him to a divine station; and man will make no real progress until illumined by this power of love. Strive to increase the love-force of reality, to make your hearts greater centers of attraction, to create new ideals and relationships.”

Love transforms into joyful service the daily routine. Life is so difficult for many of us that there is a blessed relief in knowing that if even the humdrum daily tasks are performed in the love of God they carry with them an acceptable service to God. Such daily work is an act of worship.

“In the Bahá’í Cause, arts, sciences and all the crafts are considered worship. The man who makes a piece of notepaper to the best of his ability, conscientiously concentrating all his forces on perfecting it, is giving praise to God. Briefly, all effort and exertion put forth by man from the fullness of his heart is worship, if it is prompted by the highest motive and the will to do service to humanity. This is worship; to serve mankind and minister to people’s needs. Service is prayer. A physician ministering to the sick, gently, tenderly, free from prejudice, and believing in the solidarity of the human race—he is offering praise.”

[Page 426] “If one possesses the love of God, everything that he undertakes is useful, but if the undertaking is without the love of God, then it is hurtful and the cause of veiling one’s self from the Lord of the Kingdom. But with the love of God every bitterness is changed into sweetness and every gift becometh precious. For instance, a musical and melodious voice imparteth life to an attracted heart but lureth toward lust those souls who are engulfed in passion and desire.

“With the love of God all sciences are accepted and beloved, but without it, are fruitless; nay, rather the cause of insanity. Every science is like unto a tree; if the fruit of it is the love of God, that is a blessed tree. Otherwise it is dried wood and finally a food for fire.”

The Bahá’í teachings do not dwell specially upon physical healing, but there are explicit statements that, if man can attain to the love of God, the creative power of His love will aid man in controlling many diseases. We are told that purely physical diseases need physical remedies, and often the care and skill of a physician; but that many ills are more or less outgrowths of a diseased mind or spirit, and for them spiritual power may be a remedy. In answer to requests from believers for aid in healing, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá made these replies:

“Turn thou toward God with thy heart beating with His love, devoted to His praise, gazing toward His Kingdom, and seeking help from His Holy Spirit in a state of ecstasy, rapture, love, yearning, joy and fragrance. God will assist thee, through a Spirit from His Presence, to heal sickness and diseases.”

“Continue in healing hearts and bodies and seek healing for sick persons by turning unto the Supreme Kingdom and by setting the heart upon obtaining healing through the power of the Greatest Name and by the spirit of the love of God.”

Many believers have asked how to be guided into a knowledge of the mysteries of the universe, both physical and spiritual. Answers to such questions constitute a body of instruction for the student of spiritual affairs. Of course, they can not be entered upon here. Love, we are told, is the great revealer of mysteries:

“Shouldst thou make firm thy feet in the love of God and hold steadfast to the Great Cause, God will reveal unto thee mysteries unheard by the ears and incomprehensible by the intellects.”

These are but a few of the explanations of the growth, change and power that will be man’s portion if he loves God so that God may love him, and turns this love into a happy service for his fellow men. One is almost overwhelmed at possibilities of the future opened to the human race through the love of God.

LAW OF LOVE

As there is no beginning so there is no end to the teachings on love in this new Dispensation, leading us to realize that there is neither beginning nor end to the creative and transforming power of divine love. In talks by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, given in Paris, and published in 1912, there is a discourse on “the Universal Love;” it is a clear, brief analysis of loves in this world, and of the “one perfect love,” but [Page 427] it is too long for use here. There are many outpourings of love in these talks to the Paris believers which warm our hearts and cheer us in the struggle of life. This is one that speaks to every one of us:

“If we suffer, it is the outcome of material things, and all the trials and troubles come from this world of illusion . . . . whereas the Spiritual Kingdom never causes sadness. A man living with his thoughts in this Kingdom knows perpetual joy. The ills all flesh is heir to do not pass him by, but they only touch the surface of his life, the depths are calm and serene.

“Today, humanity is bowed down with trouble, sorrow and grief, no one escapes; the world is wet with tears; but, thank God, the remedy is at our doors. Let us turn away from the world of matter, and live in the Spiritual World! It alone can give us freedom! If we are hemmed in by difficulties we have only to call upon God, and by His great mercy we shall be helped.

“You see all around you proofs of the inadequateness of material things —how joy, comfort, peace and consolation are not to be found in the transitory things of the world. Is it not then foolishness to refuse to seek these treasures where they may be found? The doors of the Spiritual Kingdom are open to all, and without is absolute darkness.”

God’s love is the opener of this Kingdom.

Life guidance is in these touching words in ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s farewell to the believers in Chicago, as He was leaving that city, in 1912:

“Be in perfect unity. Never become angry with one another. Let your eyes be directed toward the kingdom of truth and not toward the world of creation. Love the creatures for the sake of God and not for themselves. You will never become angry or impatient if you love them for the sake of God. Humanity is not perfect. There are imperfections in every human being and you will always become unhappy if you look toward the people themselves. But if you look toward God you will love them and be kind to them, for the world of God is the world of perfection and complete mercy. Therefore do not look at the shortcomings of anybody; see with the sight of forgiveness. The imperfect eye beholds imperfections. The eye that covers faults looks toward the creator of souls. He created them, trains and provided for them, endows them with capacity and life, sight and hearing; therefore they are the signs of His grandeur. You must love and be kind to everybody, care for the poor, protect the weak, heal the sick, teach and educate the ignorant.”

No study of the messages on love that have been given to man could be complete without the so-called “Letter of Love.” Written many years ago by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to one of the earlier believers in the United States, it is a summary of God’s message of love to the world. To understand it would be to know many of the mysteries of the Infinite.

“Have full assurance that love is the mystery of the appearance of God; that love is the divine aspect of God; that love is spiritual grace; [Page 428] that love is the light of the Kingdom; that love is as the breath of the Holy Spirit in the spirit of man. Love is the cause of the manifestation of truth in the material world. Love is the essential bond of union which exists between God and all things in their ultimate reality. Love is the source of the greatest happiness of the material and the spiritual worlds. Love is the light by which man is guided in the midst of darkness. Love is the communication between truth and man in the realm of consciousness. Love is the means of growth for all who are enlightened.

“Love is the highest law in this great universe of God. Love is the law of order between simple essences, whereby they are apportioned and united into compound substances in this world of matter. Love is the essential and magnetic power that organizes the planets and stars which shine in infinite space. Love supplies the impulse to that intense and unceasing meditation which reveals the hidden mysteries of the universe.

“Love is the highest honor for all the nations of men. To that people in whom God causes love to appear the Supreme Concourse, the angels of heaven, and the hosts of the kingdom of the Glorious One make salutation. When the hearts of a people are void of this Divine power—of the love of God—they will descend to the lowest estate of mortals, they will wander in the desert of error, they will fall into the slough of despair and there is no deliverance for them. They become like worms which delight in groveling in the earth.

“O friends of God! be ye manifestations of the love of God and lamps of guidance in all horizons, shining by the light of love and harmony.”

Another priceless lesson which no seeker after spiritual truth should fail to study frequently and deeply is the “Law of Love,” from the pen of Bahá’u’lláh:

“Say: O friend! Sleep with your face turned to the Friend, and rest in bed in the thought of the loved One. From flowers inhale the fragrance of the beloved One, and in every fire see the light of the desired One. I swear by the life of the Friend, that if thou smellest the garment of Joseph and enterest the Egypt of the love of God, thou wilt become the mother of all the chosen ones! Then exert thyself in love with thy soul and enter the abode of the beloved One with thy heart. Abandon grief for the world to its people and give no heed to the limited days of this world; be seated on the immortal, everlasting throne, be clad in a divine raiment, drink the wine of love from the cup of the beloved One, become ablaze with the light of love, and sew the robe of love! This is that matter which shall never change! Know thou, therefore, that in every age and dispensation all Divine Ordinances are changed and transformed according to the requirements of the time, except the law of love, which, like unto a fountain, flows always and is never overtaken by change. This is of the wonderful mysteries which God has mentioned for His servants! Verily, He is the merciful, the compassionate!”

Ceaselessly the Pageant of Love moves on. Out of the “Eternal Being” [Page 429] of God there proceeds the creative principle of love. God loves the creation of man, and there comes into existence a physical, material being, destined to live in a material world, but gifted with the possibility of a spiritual development that shall bring him into an inheritance of Divine Love. Out of the love and bounty of God, teachers are sent to man, some of them so highly inspired as to be in reality Manifestations of the Divine. Love is the tongue of these Manifestations of God; love is the awakening principle; love is the magnet attracting the souls of men. Some individuals become so filled with the truth and beauty taught by these messengers that they, in their turn, as disciples and followers of the Manifestations, carry afar the story of God’s love and power, and of the manifest destiny of man here in this material world. Slowly, the human race becomes conscious of this destiny, and more and more able to comprehend and follow the teachings, fuller and more spiritual with every successive Manifestation. Intelligence increases, knowledge abounds, love flames out, burning up the hatred, enmities and miseries of man, and civilization approaches ever nearer to the plan of the loving, merciful and just God. So moves ever onward the pageant of Divine Love.

---

THE holy Manifestations of God come into the world to dispel the darkness of the animal or physical nature of man, to purify him from his imperfections in order that his heavenly and spiritual nature may become quickened, his divine qualities awakened, his perfections visible, his potential powers revealed and all the virtues of the world of humanity latent within him may come to life. These holy Manifestations of God are the educators and trainers of the world of existence, the teachers of the world of humanity. They liberate man from the darkness of the world of nature, deliver him from despair, error, ignorance, imperfections and all evil qualities. They clothe him in the garment of perfections and exalted virtues. Men are ignorant; the Manifestations of God make them wise. They are animalistic; the Manifestations make them human. They are savage and cruel; the Manifestations lead them into kingdoms of light and love.—‘Abdu’l-Bahá

[Page 430]

THE WORLD ORDER OF BAHÁ’U’LLÁH

By MARY COLLISON

1. SOCIAL ORDERS OF THE PAST

INTELLIGENCE is not the ability to accumulate a vast store of facts but rather the ability to correlate facts. New inventions, scientific theories or philosophies are alike in that they find new relationships among facts already well-known.

So it is to be expected that when Divine Intelligence speaks through a Manifestation of God, new relationships in every sphere of life will be revealed. And as often happens with human inspiration, the new vision seems so simple, so reasonable that we wonder why no one has ever thought of it before. Bahá’ís have all marveled at the new insight that Bahá’u’lláh has given them along many lines.

The new point of view from which we wish to approach our subject lies in the simple yet hitherto unseen truth that the teachings of each Manifestation consist of two parts; the spiritual principles that never change but are repeated each time with fresh emphasis and power, and the social teachings that vary according to the needs of the people at the time when they were given. Could anything be more reasonable? It explains so many difficulties and removes so many misunderstandings. The seeming inconsistencies among different religions have been a fertile soil for prejudices and a real handicap to an appreciation of that other new Bahá’í concept, the principle of progressive revelation. Through the simple method of grouping all religious teachings under two categories, Bahá’u’lláh gives order and purpose and wholeness to the multitude of religious ideas that had formerly seemed like the meaningless, confusing, unrelated pieces of an unsolved jigsaw puzzle.

Although we recognize that each phase is dependent upon the other and that either aspect of truth alone would be disastrously incomplete, it is with the social teachings of Bahá’u’lláh that we are especially concerned.

As we review the known history of [Page 431] former religions with this new point of view in mind, we find that social teachings were given in every instance according to the stage of development and the requirements of that time. Unlike the spiritual principles, these social ordinances vary tremendously. Sometimes when the civilizations most directly concerned were at about the same stage of development, the laws of two prophets show some similarity as in the case of Moses and Muhammad. Sometimes when social conditions have radically changed one Prophet will reverse the law of a preceding one as in the divorce laws of Jesus and Moses. Sometimes nearly all the ordinances relate to devotional or other religious aspects; other times they deal with such worldly matters as the interest on money. Never before the Bahá’í, however, have the explicit laws and principles of any one Manifestation been sufficiently inclusive of all phases of human life—personal, social and spiritual—to justify one in calling them a social order.

Nevertheless, from the beginning of history, we find the Divine Educators of different peoples and different eras speaking of a time when the earth will be ruled by the laws of God. In fact this promise of the millennium or the Kingdom of God on earth has been held out to man for so many thousands of years that impatient, short-sighted humanity has begun to doubt the literal fulfillment of the promise and to interpret it in terms that are personal rather than universal, that pertain to the inner rather than the outer life.

How disturbing, then, to these people to hear Bahá’ís speak of the world order of Bahá’u’lláh as if it were a social order revealed by God, the actual beginning of the long-promised establishment of the Kingdom of God. Those of them who have had a superficial contact with the preliminary framework of that world order—our present administrative system—express doubts which Shoghi Effendi clearly formulates.

“Where and how does this Order established by Bahá’u’lláh, which to outward seeming is but a replica of the institutions established in Christianity and Islam, differ from them? Are not the twin institutions of the House of Justice and of the Guardianship, the institution of the Hands of the Cause of God, the institution of the national and local Assemblies, but different names for the institutions of the Papacy and the Caliphate, with all their attending ecclesiastical orders which the Christians and Moslems uphold and advocate? . . . Why should they not eventually suffer the self-same fate that has over-taken the institutions which the successors of Christ and Muhammad have reared?”

The answers to all these questions are to be found in a consideration of the source of the principles, the institutions and the succession of authority upon which the visible Order of Bahá’u’lláh rests. Let us again quote Shoghi Effendi:

“That Bahá’u’lláh in His Book of Aqdás, and later ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in His Will—a document which confirms, supplements and correlates the provisions of the Aqdás—have set forth in their entirety those essential elements [Page 432] for the constitution of the world Bahá’í Commonwealth, no one who has read them will deny. According to these divinely-ordained administrative principles, the Dispensation of Bahá’u’lláh—the Ark of human salvation—must needs be modelled. . . . For Bahá’u’lláh, we should readily recognize, has not only imbued mankind with a new and regenerating Spirit. He has not merely enunciated certain universal principles, or propounded a particular philosophy, however potent, sound and universal these may be. In addition to these, He, as well as ‘Abdu’l-Bahá after Him, have, unlike the Dispensations of the past, clearly and specifically laid down a set of Laws, established definite institutions, and provided for the essentials of a Divine Economy.”

HERE is something quite different from the ecclesiastical organizations of Christianity. Shoghi Effendi says: “The edifice which the Fathers of the Church reared after the passing of His first apostles was an edifice that rested in nowise upon the explicit directions of Christ Himself. The authority and features of their administration were wholly inferred and indirectly derived, with more or less justification, from certain vague and fragmentary references which they found scattered amongst His utterances as recorded in the Gospel.”

Another point which has caused endless and serious difficulty in both Christianity and Islam is the lack of explicit and incontrovertible provision, by the Manifestation Himself, for the succession of authority following His departure from this world. As Shoghi Effendi says in regard to Christ, “. . . None did He specifically invest with sufficient authority to either interpret His Word, or to add to what He had not specifically enjoined. For this reason, in later generations, voices were raised in protest against the self-appointed authority which arrogated to itself privileges and powers which did not emanate from the clear text of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and which constituted a grave departure from the spirit which that Gospel did inculcate.”

“Not so with the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh,” says Shoghi Effendi, “Unlike the dispensation of Christ, unlike the dispensation of Muhammad, unlike all the dispensations of the past, the apostles of Bahá’u’lláh in every land, wherever they labor and toil, have before them in clear, in unequivocal and emphatic language, all the laws, the regulations, the principles, the institutions, the guidance, they require for the prosecution and consummation of their task. Both in the administrative provisions of the Bahá’í Dispensation, and in the matter of succession, as embodied in the twin institutions of the House of Justice and of the Guardianship, the followers of Bahá’u’lláh can summon to their aid such irrefutable evidences of Divine Guidance that none can resist, that none can belittle or ignore. Therein lies the distinguishing feature of the Bahá’í Revelation.”

Although the basis of Bahá’í Administration lies in the explicit, written [Page 433] teachings of Bahá’u’lláh and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, it is only within the last fifteen years that most of us under the inspired guidance of Shoghi Effendi have become administration minded. Now, to again quote, “Few will fail to recognize that the Spirit breathed by Bahá’u’lláh upon the world . . . can never permeate and exercise an abiding influence upon mankind unless and until it incarnates itself in a Visible Order, which would bear His name, wholly identify itself with His principles and function in conformity with His laws.” Many familiar passages gain new administrative significance as the penetrating light of the Guardian’s interpretive ability is directed upon them, so that our understanding and appreciation of Bahá’u’lláh’s unique gift to the world grows day by day.

Bahá’u’lláh says, “Consider the sun . . . How gradually its warmth and potency increase. . . Were it all of a sudden to manifest the energies latent within it, it would no doubt cause injury to all created things. . . . In like manner, if the Sun of Truth were suddenly to reveal, at the earliest stages of its manifestation, the full measure of the potencies which the providence of the Almighty hath bestowed upon it, the earth of human understanding would waste away and be consumed.”

DOES not this principle of gradual growth apply to any one revelation of God as well as to the succession of Manifestations? Does not present-day administration represent but a definite point in the unfolding of the social order of Bahá’u’lláh? Until comparatively recent years its importance, its potency, the direction of its development and its ultimate goal was not even dimly seen by His followers. Is this strange, something to be looked at with askance? Is it not rather a great blessing?

AS we advance through whatever social changes lie ahead, let us keep such words as these in mind: “Let no one, while this System is still in its infancy, misconceive its character, belittle its significance or misrepresent its purpose. The bedrock on which this Administrative Order is founded is God’s immutable Purpose for mankind in this day. The Source from which it derives its inspiration is no one less than Bahá’u’lláh Himself. . . . The axis round which its institutions revolve are the authentic provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. Its guiding principles are the truths which He who is the unerring Interpreter of the teachings of our Faith has so clearly enunciated in His public addresses throughout the West. The laws that govern its operation and limit its functions are those which have been expressly ordained in the Kitáb-i-Aqdás . . . The central, the underlying aim which animates it is the establishment of the New World Order as adumbrated by Bahá’u’lláh. . . . Its watchword is the unification of the human race; its standard the Most Great Peace; its consummation the advent of that golden millennium—the Day when the kingdoms of this world shall have become the Kingdom of God Himself, the Kingdom of Bahá’u’lláh.”

[Page 434]

THE SPIRIT FROM GOD

By ‘ABDU’L-BAHÁ

Question.—In the Bible it is said that God breathed the spirit into the body of man: What is the meaning of this verse?

KNOW that proceeding is of two kinds: the proceeding and appearance through emanation, and the proceeding and appearance through manifestation. The proceeding through emanation is like the coming forth of the action from the actor, of the writing from the writer. Now the writing emanates from the writer, and the discourse emanates from the speaker, and in the same way the human spirit emanates from God. It is not that it manifests God —that is to say, no part has been detached from the Divine Reality to enter the body of man. No, as the discourse emanates from the speaker, the spirit appears in the body of man.

But the proceeding through manifestation is the manifestation of the reality of a thing in other forms: like the coming forth of this tree from the seed of the tree, or the coming forth of the flower from the seed of the flower for it is the seed itself which appears in the form of the branches, leaves, and flowers. This is called the proceeding through manifestation. The spirits of men, with reference to God, have dependence through emanation; just as the discourse proceeds from the speaker and the writing from the writer; that is to say, the speaker himself does not become the discourse, nor does the writer himself become the writing; no, rather they have the proceeding of emanation. The speaker has perfect ability and power, and the discourse emanates from him, as the action does from the actor. The Real Speaker, the Essence of Unity, has always been in one condition, which neither changes nor alters, has neither transformation nor vicissitude. He is the Erernal, the Immortal. Therefore the proceeding of the human spirits from God is through emanation. When it is said in the Bible that God breathed His spirit into man, this spirit is that which, like the discourse, emanates from the Real Speaker, taking effect in the reality of man.

But the proceeding through manifestation (if by this is meant the divine appearance, and not division into parts), we have said, is the proceeding and the appearance of the Holy Spirit and the Word which is from God. As it is said in the Gospel of John, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God”; then the Holy Spirit and the Word are the appearance of God. The Spirit and the Word mean the divine perfections that appeared in the Reality of Christ, and these perfections were with God; so the sun manifests all [Page 435] its glory in the mirror. For the Word does not signify the body of Christ; no, but the divine perfections manifested in Him. For Christ was like a clear mirror which was facing the Sun of Reality; and the perfections of the Sun of Reality, that is to say its light and heat were visible and apparent in this mirror. If we look into the mirror we see the sun, and we say: it is the sun. Therefore the Word and the Holy Spirit, which signify the perfections of God, are the divine appearance. This is the meaning of the verse in the Gospel which says: “The Word was with God, and the Word was God”; for the divine perfections are not different from the Essence of Oneness. The perfections of Christ are called the Word, because all the beings are in the condition of letters and one letter has not a complete meaning; whilst the perfections of Christ have the power of the word, because a complete meaning can be inferred from a word. As the Reality of Christ was the manifestation of the divine perfections, therefore it was like the word. Why? because He is the sum of perfect meanings. This is why He is called the Word.

And know that the proceeding of the Word and the Holy Spirit from God, which is the proceeding and appearance of manifestation, must not be understood to mean that the Reality of Divinity had been divided into parts, or multiplied, or that it had descended from the exaltation of holiness and purity. God forbid! If a pure, fine mirror faces the sun, the light and heat, the form and the image of the sun will be resplendent in it with such manifestation, that if a beholder says of the sun which is brilliant and visible in the mirror: “This is the sun,” it is true. Nevertheless the mirror is the mirror, and the sun is the sun. The One Sun, even if it appears in numerous mirrors, is one. This state is neither abiding nor entering, neither commingling nor descending; for entering, abiding, descending, issuing forth and commingling are the necessities and characteristics of bodies, not of spirits; then how much less do they belong to the sanctified and pure Reality of God. God is exempt from all that is not in accordance with His purity, and His exalted and sublime sanctity.

The Sun of Reality, as we have said, has always been in one condition; it has no change, no alteration, no transformation, and no vicissitude. It is eternal and everlasting. But the Holy Reality of the Word of God is in the condition of the pure, fine, and shining mirror; the heat, the light, the image and likeness, that is to say the perfections of the Sun of Reality, appear in it. That is why Christ says in the Gospel: “The Father is in the Son”, that ts to say, the Sun of Reality appears in the mirror. Praise be to the One who shone upon this Holy Reality, who is sanctified among the beings!

[Page 436]

SIGNS OF THE TIMES

By BERTHA HYDE KIRKPATRICK

As I see the situation, the science, philosophy, art, and religion of the future should be built in such a manner that each may contribute its part to a structure that will give a safer and more pleasant abode than any that man has thus far designed.

One of the greatest advances of all time, was that expressed ages ago in the view that there is in the universe one power in many forms, or, in the terms of religion, one God instead of many warring deities. It may be in order for mankind to make this discovery anew, or from time to time, when unity in views of the world and of belief seems threatened by erection of too many temples to deities of varying and perhaps inconsistent missions, in a world that, so far as nature is concerned, has operated as one system since time’s beginning.—JOHN C. MERRIAM in The Torch.

Already there is discussion concerning the major religious theme for the projected 1939 world’s fair in New York, One of the proposals is that the prophetic spirit of religion be somehow made an overarching theme of the entire fair: The civilization of the future, suffused with the hopes and aspirations that characterize every great spiritual enterprise.—The Christian Century.

The only hope for peace and justice for the modern world lies in the social dynamic of religion, which moves men to brotherhood by methods which do not defeat the ends they seek to serve.—A. J. MUSTE, quoted in Christian Century.

By religion we mean those necessary bonds which unify the world of humanity. This has ever been the essence of the religion of God. —‘ABDU’L-BAHÁ.

In our new epoch it is not helpful to complain of unalterable facts, and declare we cannot deal with them because the old methods do not fit them. New circumstances require new laws. There is nothing so narrow as the egotism of precedent.—ALBERT J. BEVERIDGE, quoted in Foreign Affairs Interpreter.

We are accustomed to say that Islam conquered with the sword; yet force probably played as large a part in the conquest of medieval Europe by Christianity as it did in the spread of Mohammadanism.—GUY W. SARVIS in Christendom.

There is no hope in an education, however elaborate it may be, which does not include a basic sense of ethical and moral obligation. Man has [Page 437] reached the point in his evolution where his bodily equipment and even his intellectual equipment must be augmented by these great moral and intellectual forces—those inherent human qualities which in the last analysis determine the direction of political and economic movements. —WILLETT L. HARDIN in World Affairs Interpreter.

We stand face to face with the greatest crisis in the history of the world. We are living in a time of conflict between two conceptions of human development. On the one hand is the conception of war and violence as a regenerative agent in human society—a conception which has behind it some moral force and the support of many material factors. On the other hand there is the conception of the collective peace system. One conception gives vent to the destructive and aggressive elements in human nature, the other emphasises the factor of integration and constructiveness, and the conflict between the two has reached a crisis. —H. DUNCAN HALL.

It (peace) is the indispensable foundation of human freedom and human progress. It is the framework in which alone the constructive genius of mankind can have unhampered scope to create an advancing civilization in terms of material comfort, cultural development, and spiritual happiness. —SECRETARY CORDELL HULL.

Few scientific men today defend the atheistic attitude. The more we learn about the world in which we live, the less the probability that it is the product of chance. Never yet has there been adequate refutation of the argument that design in the universe presumes an intelligence. Evidence points to the existence of a Beginner, a Creator of the universe. A physicist’s studies and experiments lead him to believe this Creator to be an intelligent Being. From a biological point of view, the studies cause one to conclude there is an Intelligence back of all earthly things, leading to a definite end or conclusion. The intelligent God has an interest in and relation to man. And it is reasonable to assume that He would be interested in creating a being intelligent like Himself.—DR. ARTHUR H. COMPTON, in The Detroit News.

Peace education does mean that we should instill into the minds of pupils ideas of the brotherhood of man, respect for the institutions, manners and customs of other peoples as well as for our own institutions, and an appreciation of the sanctity of human life, regardless of race, color or creed. —DR. CAMPBELL, Superintendent of Schools in New York.

The philosophy of the future will endeavor to reconcile the good which is in the competitive, individualistic and libertarian concepts of the 19th century with the cooperative concepts which seem to me destined to dominate the late 20th century. —SECRETARY HENRY WALLACE.

[Page 438]

TO A TEACHER

By ROSE NOLLER

SPIRITED on pinions through space,

He is himself, magnificent!

He makes the ethers solid;

He builds a star-spire for the furure;

He informs with poetry.

His brain is spangled with the heat

Of his divinity!

He climbs into the falterer’s steps

And makes a sturdy stride.

He fires the agnostic,

The cynic, the believer,

Into a unity of mold.

He breaks the model of clay

With an iron gesture,

And flashes the gold of Truth

Until it humbly bows to Beauty.

There can be no modification

Of his foundation.

It is the same as yours and mine,

Only he spins our frustrations

Into the meshes of a web

Where filters his star-self!

Give me such stuff

To build a body

For a dream now bodiless;

So that a seventh heaven

May shine in every raindrop;

So that “root and all” of flowers

Shall be unriddled;

So that every phase of division

Shall be fashioned seamless.

Reveal me a goddess!

My destiny,

Immortality!

[Page 439]

THE CHIEF WORLD MOVEMENTS

Book Review

By MARTHA L. ROOT

AMONG the books receiving international comment is “Cosmométapolis” by Eugen Relgis of Bucharest, Rumania. It is written in Rumanian but has a French edition translated by Rose Arp. The author is a world-known peace worker and writer and has been the founder of the Pacifist International of the Intellectuals.

“Cosmométapolis” has this stirring foreword: “This is not for others, it is for you; and it is not for tomorrow, it is for today!” The very word Cosmométapolis signifies humanity above the nations or the universal above the cities. This book is a synthesis of some of the chief international movements of this century, rational, social, religious, and chapter nine is devoted entirely to “The Bahá’í Movement.” The volume is most interesting because it is addressed to all types throughout the world. A great proof of its power is the press notices and comments which have appeared in more than twenty-six magazines in different languages and in different lands during the three months since its appearance. The author too, has received more than one hundred letters from thinkers of Europe and other continents, representatives of many different philosophical and social schools.

Analyzing the book, many writers have specially mentioned the chapter on the Bahá’í Movement, (1) citing either that it was the first time they [Page 440] had heard of this Faith; or (2) that they were glad to meet again such a clear exposé of this universal religion; or (3) some attacked the movement; or (4) others gave a precise and profound study of the Bahá’í Teachings. One man from Haifa, Palestine, stated that from the book he first heard of the history of the Bahá’í Faith and went immediately to visit the Shrines of the Founders and was delighted with all he had learned.

The International Bahá’í Bureau in Geneva had just sent Mr. Relgis a letter stating they had a copy of the book and found the chapter on the Bahá’í Movement exact and illuminating.

From Paris, Marseilles, Nancy, Brussels, Vienna, Bucharest, Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, and from Australia excellent paragraphs have been written in leading magazines about the Bahá’í Movement in connection with this Chapter Nine of “Cosmométapolis”. I cite the following among the many book reviews which speak especially of the Bahá’í Faith: Felix Frankl wrote most eloquently and fully in the “Allgemeine Nährpflicht”, Vienna, December, 1935; also, discussions appeared in the Brazilian paper “Correio de Brasil” of Rio de Janeiro, November 11, 1935; “La Prensa”, Buenos Aires, December 15, 1935; “Tiempos Nuevos” Barcelona, January, 1936; “Le Rouge et le Noir” Bruxelles, November 27, 1935; “Gazeta”, Bucharest, October 25, 1935, “Cuvantul Liber” Bucharest, October 26, 1935, and “L’Echo de la Grande Nouvelle” (8 pages) July 1935, etc.