and shall give it for an
heritage unto such of His servants as are nigh unto Him."

"As to those who deny Him Who is the Sublime Gate of God," the Bab, for
His part, has affirmed in the Qayyum-i-Asma, "for them We have prepared,
as justly decreed by God, a sore torment. And He, God, is the Mighty, the
Wise." And further, "O peoples of the earth! I swear by your Lord! Ye
shall act as former generations have acted. Warn ye, then, yourselves of
the terrible, the most grievous vengeance of God. For God is, verily,
potent over all things." And again: "By My glory! I will make the infidels
to taste, with the hands of My power, retributions unknown of anyone
except Me, and will waft over the faithful those musk-scented breaths
which I have nursed in the midmost heart of My throne."

Dear friends! The powerful operations of this titanic upheaval are
comprehensible to none except such as have recognized the claims of both
Baha'u'llah and the Bab. Their followers know full well whence it comes,
and what it will ultimately lead to. Though ignorant of how far it will
reach, they clearly recognize its genesis, are aware of its direction,
acknowledge its necessity, observe confidently its mysterious processes,
ardently pray for the mitigation of its severity, intelligently labor to
assuage its fury, and anticipate, with undimmed vision, the consummation
of the fears and the hopes it must necessarily engender.

THIS JUDGMENT OF GOD

This judgment of God, as viewed by those who have recognized Baha'u'llah
as His Mouthpiece and His greatest Messenger on earth, is both a
retributory calamity and an act of holy and supreme discipline. It is at
once a visitation from God and a cleansing process for all mankind. Its
fires punish the perversity of the human race, and weld its component
parts into one organic, indivisible, world-embracing community. Mankind,
in these fateful years, which at once signalize the passing of the first
century of the Baha'i Era and proclaim the opening of a new one, is, as
ordained by Him Who is both the Judge and the Redeemer of the human race,
being simultaneously called upon to give account of its past actions, and
is being purged and prepared for its future mission. It can neither escape
the responsibilities of the past, nor shirk those of the future. God, the
Vigilant, the Just, the Loving, the All-Wise Ordainer, can, in this
supreme Dispensation, neither allow the sins of an unregenerate humanity