proud before God and His loved ones; recalls the tribulations, and extols
the virtues, of the Imam Husayn; prays that He Himself may suffer similar
afflictions; prophesies that erelong God will raise up a people who will
recount His troubles and demand the restitution of His rights from His
oppressors; and calls upon them to give ear to His words, and return unto
God and repent.

And finally, addressing the people of Persia, He, in that same Tablet,
affirms that were they to put Him to death God will assuredly raise up One
in His stead, and asserts that the Almighty will "perfect His light"
though they, in their secret hearts, abhor it.

So weighty a proclamation, at so critical a period, by the Bearer of so
sublime a Message, to the kings of the earth, Muslim and Christian alike,
to ministers and ambassadors, to the ecclesiastical heads of Sunni Islam,
to the wise men and inhabitants of Constantinople--the seat of both the
Sultanate and the Caliphate--to the philosophers of the world and the
people of Persia, is not to be regarded as the only outstanding event
associated with Baha'u'llah's sojourn in Adrianople. Other developments
and happenings of great, though lesser, significance must be noted in
these pages, if we would justly esteem the importance of this agitated and
most momentous phase of Baha'u'llah's ministry.

It was at this period, and as a direct consequence of the rebellion and
appalling downfall of Mirza Yahya, that certain disciples of Baha'u'llah
(who may well rank among the "treasures" promised Him by God when bowed
down with chains in the Siyah-_Ch_al of Tihran), including among them one
of the Letters of the Living, some survivors of the struggle of Tabarsi,
and the erudite Mirza Ahmad-i-Az_gh_andi, arose to defend the newborn
Faith, to refute, in numerous and detailed apologies, as their Master had
done in the Kitab-i-Badi', the arguments of His opponents, and to expose
their odious deeds. It was at this period that the limits of the Faith
were enlarged, when its banner was permanently planted in the Caucasus by
the hand of Mulla Abu-Talib and others whom Nabil had converted, when its
first Egyptian center was established at the time when Siyyid
Husayn-i-Ka_sh_ani and Haji Baqir-i-Ka_sh_ani took up their residence in
that country, and when to the lands already warmed and illuminated by the
early rays of God's Revelation--'Iraq, Turkey and Persia--Syria was added.
It was in this period that the g