today they are
dreadnoughts. Consider the increase and improvement in the weapons of war.
God has created us all human, and all countries of the world are parts of
the same globe. We are all His servants. He is kind and just to all. Why
should we be unkind and unjust to each other? He provides for all. Why
should we deprive one another? He protects and preserves all. Why should
we kill our fellow creatures? If this warfare and strife be for the sake
of religion, it is evident that it violates the spirit and basis of all
religion. All the divine Manifestations have proclaimed the oneness of God
and the unity of mankind. They have taught that men should love and
mutually help each other in order that they might progress. Now if this
conception of religion be true, its essential principle is the oneness of
humanity. The fundamental truth of the Manifestations is peace. This
underlies all religion, all justice. The divine purpose is that men should
live in unity, concord and agreement and should love one another. Consider
the virtues of the human world and realize that the oneness of humanity is
the primary foundation of them all. Read the Gospel and the other Holy
Books. You will find their fundamentals are one and the same. Therefore,
unity is the essential truth of religion and, when so understood, embraces
all the virtues of the human world. Praise be to God! This knowledge has
been spread, eyes have been opened, and ears have become attentive.
Therefore, we must endeavor to promulgate and practice the religion of God
which has been founded by all the Prophets. And the religion of God is
absolute love and unity.

19 April 1912
Talk at Bowery Mission
227 Bowery, New York

From Stenographic Notes

Tonight I am very happy, for I have come here to meet my friends. I
consider you my relatives, my companions; and I am your comrade.

You must be thankful to God that you are poor, for Jesus Christ has said,
"Blessed are the poor." He never said, "Blessed are the rich." He said,
too, that the Kingdom is for the poor and that it is easier for a camel to
enter a needle's eye than for a rich man to enter God's Kingdom.
Therefore, you must be thankful to God that although in this world you are
indigent, yet the treasures of God are within your reach; and although in
the material realm you are poor, yet in the Kingdom of God you are
precious. Jesus Himself was poor. He did not belong to the rich. He passed
His time in t