I have come here to visit you. With the greatest longing I have wished to
see you. Realizing it was only with great difficulty that you could come
to me and that very few could make the trip, I decided to come to you so
that all might have the pleasure of meeting. Praise be to God! I am here,
and I am looking into your faces--faces radiant with inner beauty, hearts
attracted to the Kingdom of Abha, spirits exhilarated through the glad
tidings of God. Therefore, I have experienced the greatest possible
happiness. And surely this happiness must be mutual, for the hearts are
connected with each other and are filled with the same vibration. The
flame and the light of love are reflected in all. Spiritual
susceptibilities and heart longings fill every heart. If we should offer a
hundred thousand thanksgivings every moment to the threshold of God for
this love which has blended the Orient and Occident, we would fail to
express our gratitude sufficiently. If all the powers of earth should seek
to bring about this love between East and West, they would prove
incapable. If they wished to establish this unity, it would prove
impossible. But Baha'u'llah has accomplished both through the power of the
Holy Spirit, and this bond of unity through love is indissoluble. It shall
continue unto time everlasting, and day by day its power shall increase.
Erelong it shall enchain the world, and eventually the hearts of all the
nations of the world will be brought together by its constraining clasp.
The world of humanity shall become the manifestation of the lights of
Divinity, and the bestowals of God shall surround all. From the
standpoints of both material and spiritual civilization extraordinary
progress and development will be witnessed. In this present cycle there
will be an evolution in civilization unparalleled in the history of the
world. The world of humanity has, heretofore, been in the stage of
infancy; now it is approaching maturity. Just as the individual human
organism, having attained the period of maturity, reaches its fullest
degree of physical strength and ripened intellectual faculties so that in
one year of this ripened period there is witnessed an unprecedented
measure of development, likewise the world of humanity in this cycle of
its completeness and consummation will realize an immeasurable upward
progress, and that power of accomplishment whereof each individual human
reality is the depository of God--that outworking Universal Spirit--like the
intellectual faculty, will reveal itself in infinite degrees of
perfection.
Therefore, thank ye God that ye have come into the plane of existence in
this radiant century wherein the bestowals of God are appearing from all
directions, when the doors of the Kingdom have been opened unto you, the
call of God is being raised, and the virtues of the human world are in the
process of unfoldment. The day has come when all darkness is to be
dispelled, and the Sun of Truth shall shine forth radiantly. This time of
the world may be likened to the equinoctial in the annual cycle. For,
verily, this is the spring season of God. In the Holy Books a promise is
given that the springtime of God shall make itself manifest; Jerusalem,
the Holy City, shall descend from heaven; Zion shall leap forth and dance;
and the Holy Land shall be submerged in the ocean of divine effulgence.
At the time of the vernal equinox in the material world a wonderful
vibrant energy and new life-quickening is observed everywhere in the
vegetable kingdom; the animal and human kingdoms are resuscitated and move
forward with a new impulse. The whole world is born anew, resurrected.
Gentle zephyrs are set in motion, wafting and fragrant; flowers bloom; the
trees are in blossom, the air temperate and delightful; how pleasant and
beautiful become the mountains, fields and meadows. Likewise, the
spiritual bounty and springtime of God quicken the world of humanity with
a new animus and vivification. All the virtues which have been deposited
and potential in human hearts are being revealed from that Reality as
flowers and blossoms from divine gardens. It is a day of joy, a time of
happiness, a period of spiritual growth. I beg of God that this divine
spiritual civilization may have the fullest impression and effect upon
you. May you become as growing plants. May the trees of your hearts bring
forth new leaves and variegated blossoms. May ideal fruits appear from
them in order that the world of humanity, which has grown and developed in
material civilization, may be quickened in the bringing forth of spiritual
ideals. Just as human intellects have revealed the secrets of matter and
have brought forth from the realm of the invisible the mysteries of
nature, may minds and spirits, likewise, come into the knowledge of the
verities of God, and the realities of the Kingdom be made manifest in
human hearts. Then the world will be the paradise of Abha, the standard of
the Most Great Peace will be borne aloft, and the oneness of the world of
humanity in all its beauty, glory and significance will become apparent.
And now in your presence I wish to pray in your behalf. Let your hearts be
attentive and directed to the Kingdom of Abha.