us taught two thousand years ago, is "within".(78) His
organic analogies of a "vineyard",(79) of "seed [sown] into the good
ground",(80) of the "good tree [that] bringeth forth good fruit"(81) speak
of a potentiality of the human species that has been nurtured and trained
by God since the dawn of time as the purpose and leading edge of the
creative process. The ongoing work of patient cultivation is the task that
Baha'u'llah has entrusted to the company of those who recognize Him and
embrace His Cause. Little wonder, then, at the exalted language in which
He speaks of a privilege so great: "Ye are the stars of the heaven of
understanding, the breeze that stirreth at the break of day, the
soft-flowing waters upon which must depend the very life of all
men...."(82)

The process bears within itself the assurance of its fulfilment. For those
with eyes to see, the new creation is today everywhere emerging, in the
same way that a seedling becomes in time a fruit-bearing tree or a child
reaches adulthood. Successive dispensations of a loving and purposeful
Creator have brought the earth's inhabitants to the threshold of their
collective coming-of-age as a single people. Baha'u'llah is now summoning
humanity to enter on its inheritance: "That which the Lord hath ordained
as the sovereign remedy and mightiest instrument for the healing of all
the world is the union of all its peoples in one universal Cause, one
common Faith."(83)

FOOTNOTES

1 Baha'u'llah refers to the ancient Persian and Arabian story of
Majnun and Layli, _The Seven Valleys and The Four Valleys_
(Wilmette: Baha'i Publishing Trust, 1991), page 6.

_ 2 Gleanings from the Writings of Baha'u'llah_ (Wilmette: Baha'i
Publishing Trust, 1983), section LXI.

_ 3 ibid.,_ section XVI.

_ 4 Tablets of Baha'u'llah revealed after the Kitab-i-Aqdas_ (Wilmette:
Baha'i Publishing Trust, 1988), page 27.

_ 5 Gleanings,_ section XVII.

6 Baha'u'llah, _Epistle to the Son of the Wolf_ (Wilmette: Baha'i
Publishing Trust, 1988), page 133.

7 Baha'u'llah, _The Kitab-i-Iqan_ (Wilmette: Baha'i Publishing Trust,
1993), paragraph 216.

_ 8 ibid._

_ 9 ibid.,_ paragraph 104.

_ 10 ibid.,_ paragraph 106.

_ 11 Gleanings,_ section XXII.

_ 12 Prayers and Meditations by Baha'u'llah_ (Wilmette: Baha'i
Publishing Trust, 1987), page 311.

_ 13 Gleanings,_ section XXVII.

_ 14 ibid.