f the greatest
results, for all the inhabitants of the earth belong to one native land.

("'Abdu'l-Baha in London: Addresses, and Notes of Conversations",
Commemorative ed. (London: Baha'i Publishing Trust, 1987), p. 106) [46]

EXTRACTS FROM THE WRITINGS OF SHOGHI EFFENDI

47: Dearly-beloved friends! Humanity, whether viewed in the light of
man's...

Dearly-beloved friends! Humanity, whether viewed in the light of man's
individual conduct or in the existing relationships between organized
communities and nations, has, alas, strayed too far and suffered too great
a decline to be redeemed through the unaided efforts of the best among its
recognized rulers and statesmen--however disinterested their motives,
however concerted their action, however unsparing in their zeal and
devotion to its cause. No scheme which the calculations of the highest
statesmanship may yet devise, no doctrine which the most distinguished
exponents of economic theory may hope to advance, no principle which the
most ardent of moralists may strive to inculcate, can provide, in the last
resort, adequate foundations upon which the future of a distracted world
can be built. No appeal for mutual tolerance which the worldly-wise might
raise, however compelling and insistent, can calm its passions or help
restore its vigour. Nor would any general scheme of mere organized
international co-operation, in whatever sphere of human activity, however
ingenious in conception or extensive in scope, succeed in removing the
root cause of the evil that has so rudely upset the equilibrium of present
day society. Not even, I venture to assert, would the very act of devising
the machinery required for the political and economic unification of the
world--a principle that has been increasingly advocated in recent
times--provide in itself the antidote against the poison that is steadily
undermining the vigour of organized peoples and nations. What else, might
we not confidently affirm, but the unreserved acceptance of the Divine
Programme enunciated, with such simplicity and force as far back as sixty
years ago, by Baha'u'llah, embodying in its essentials God's
divinely-appointed scheme for the unification of mankind in this age,
coupled with an indomitable conviction in the unfailing efficacy of each
and all of its provisions, is eventually capable of withstanding the
forces of internal disintegration which, if unchecked, must needs continue
to eat into