One more word in conclusion. The passing, at this juncture, of one(26)
who, through a long career of distinguished service to the Cause of
Baha'u'llah, not only since the birth of this community but in more recent
years in the heart and centre of the Baha'i World, has left an indelible
mark on the annals of the Faith, has evoked not only the deepest sorrow
but the utmost regret at a time when this community is beginning to reap
at long last the first fruits of its stewardship to the Cause of God, and
the whole Baha'i World is on the eve of celebrating one of its greatest
Jubilees. By reason of his own saintly life, his self-effacement,
gentleness, loving kindness and nobility of soul; by virtue of his
remarkable endowments which he so devotedly consecrated to both the
embellishment of the slopes of God's holy mountain and the creation of a
befitting design for the second most holy Baha'i Edifice embosomed in its
very heart; and because of his kinship, on the one hand, with a wife(27)
whom posterity will regard, not only as the mother of both the Canadian
Baha'i Community and of the first Baha'i centre established on the
European continent but also as one of the foremost pioneers and martyrs of
the Faith and, on the other with a daughter(28), whose unfailing support
to me as my helpmate, in the darkest days of my life, has earned her the
title already conferred on her father--Sutherland Maxwell has left a
legacy, and achieved a position excelled by only a few among the
supporters of the Faith of Baha'u'llah throughout the eleven decades of
its existence.
Inspired by the example and the accomplishments of those of its members
who have distinguished themselves in the Holy Land, on the European
continent and in both the northern and southern continents of the Western
Hemisphere this community must forge on, with thanksgiving and redoubled
zeal, on the road leading it to a still more glorious destiny in the years
immediately ahead. That it may press forward, conquer still greater
heights, plumb greater depths of consecration, spread wider and wider the
fame of the Cause of God is the cherished desire of my heart and the
object of my constant supplication.