ps, and all manner of promiscuity, of
easy familiarity, and of sexual vices. It can tolerate no compromise with
the theories, the standards, the habits, and the excesses of a decadent
age. Nay rather it seeks to demonstrate, through the dynamic force of its
example, the pernicious character of such theories, the falsity of such
standards, the hollowness of such claims, the perversity of such habits,
and the sacrilegious character of such excesses.

"By the righteousness of God!" writes Baha'u'llah, "The world, its
vanities and its glory, and whatever delights it can offer, are all, in
the sight of God, as worthless as, nay even more contemptible than, dust
and ashes. Would that the hearts of men could comprehend it. Wash
yourselves thoroughly, O people of Baha, from the defilement of the world,
and of all that pertaineth unto it. God Himself beareth Me witness! The
things of the earth ill beseem you. Cast them away unto such as may desire
them, and fasten your eyes upon this most holy and effulgent Vision." "O
ye My loved ones!" He thus exhorts His followers, "Suffer not the hem of
My sacred vesture to be smirched and mired with the things of this world,
and follow not the promptings of your evil and corrupt desires." And
again, "O ye the beloved of the one true God! Pass beyond the narrow
retreats of your evil and corrupt desires, and advance into the vast
immensity of the realm of God, and abide ye in the meads of sanctity and
of detachment, that the fragrance of your deeds may lead the whole of
mankind to the ocean of God's unfading glory." "Disencumber yourselves,"
He thus commands them, "of all attachment to this world and the vanities
thereof. Beware that ye approach them not, inasmuch as they prompt you to
walk after your own lusts and covetous desires, and hinder you from
entering the straight and glorious Path." "Eschew all manner of
wickedness," is His commandment, "for such things are forbidden unto you
in the Book which none touch except such as God hath cleansed from every
taint of guilt, and numbered among the purified." "A race of men," is His
written promise, "incomparable in character, shall be raised up which,
with the feet of detachment, will tread under all who are in heaven and on
earth, and will cast the sleeve of holiness over all that hath been
created from water and clay." "The civilization," is His grave warning,
"so often vaunted by the learned exponents of arts and sciences, will, if
allowed t