Bahá’u’lláh was preeminently the Revealer of the Word. His forty years’ imprisonment gave Him but limited opportunities of intercourse with His fellowmen. To ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, therefore, fell the important task of becoming the exponent of the Revelation, the Doer of the Word, the Great Exemplar of the Bahá’í life in actual contact with the world of today, in the most diverse phases of its myriad activities. He showed that it is still possible, amid the whirl and rush of modern life, amid the self-love and struggle for material prosperity that everywhere prevail, to live the life of entire devotion to God and to the service of one’s fellows, which Christ and Bahá’u’lláh and all the Prophets have demanded of men. Through trial and vicissitudes, calumnies, and treachery on the one hand, and through love and praise, devotion and veneration on the other, He stood like a lighthouse founded on a rock, around which wintry tempests rage and the summer ocean plays, His poise and serenity remaining ever steadfast and unshaken. He lived the life of faith, and calls on His followers to live it here and now. He raised amid a warring world the Banner of Unity and Peace, the Standard of a New Era, and He assures those who rally to its support that they shall be inspired by the Spirit of the New Day. It is the same Holy Spirit which inspired the Prophets and Saints of old, but it is a new outpouring of that Spirit, suited to the needs of the new time. CHAPTER 5: WHAT IS A BAHÁ’Í Man must show forth fruits. A fruitless man, in the words of His Holiness the Spirit (i.e. Christ), is like a fruitless tree, and a fruitless tree is fit for fire.—BAHÁ’U’LLÁH, Words of Paradise. Herbert Spencer once remarked that by no political alchemy is it possible to get golden conduct out of leaden instincts, and it is equally true that by no political alchemy is it possible to make a golden society out of leaden individuals. Bahá’u’lláh, like all previous Prophets, proclaimed this truth and taught that in order to establish the Kingdom of God in the world, it must first be established in the hearts of men. In examining the Bahá’í teachings, therefore, we shall commence with the instructions of Bahá’u’lláh for individual conduct, and try to form a clear picture of what it means to be a Bahá’í. Living the Life When asked on one occasion: “What is a Bahá’í?” ‘Abdu’l-Bahá replied: “To be a Bahá’í simply means to love all the world; to love humanity and try to serve it; to work for universal peace and universal brotherhood.” On another occasion He defined a Bahá’í as “one endowed with all the perfections of man in activity.” In one of His London talks He said that a man may be a Bahá’í even if He has never heard the name of Bahá’u’lláh. He added:—