hath, verily, turned towards God, the Almighty, the All-Wise.” “Respect ye the divines amongst you,” is His exhortation, “They whose acts conform to the knowledge they possess, who observe the statutes of God, and decree the things God hath decreed in the Book. Know ye that they are the lamps of guidance betwixt earth and heaven. They that have no consideration for the position and merit of the divines amongst them have, verily, altered the bounty of God vouchsafed unto them.” Dear friends! I have, in the preceding pages, attempted to represent this world-afflicting ordeal that has laid its grip upon mankind as primarily a judgment of God pronounced against the peoples of the earth, who, for a century, have refused to recognize the One Whose advent had been promised to all religions, and in Whose Faith all nations can alone, and must eventually, seek their true salvation. I have quoted certain passages from the writings of Bahá’u’lláh and the Báb that reveal the character, and foreshadow the occurrence of this divinely inflicted visitation. I have enumerated the woeful trials with which the Faith, its Herald, its Founder, and its Exemplar, have been afflicted, and exposed the tragic failure of the generality of mankind and its leaders to protest against these tribulations, and to acknowledge the claims advanced by those Who bore them. I have, moreover, indicated that a direct, an awful, an inescapable responsibility rested on the sovereigns of the earth and the world’s religious leaders who, in the days of the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh, held within their grasp the reins of absolute political and religious authority. I have also endeavored to show how, as a result of the direct and active antagonism of some of them to the Faith, and the neglect by others of their unquestioned duty to investigate its truth and its claims, to vindicate its innocence, and avenge its injuries, both kings and ecclesiastics have been, and are still being, subjected to the dire punishments which their sins of omission and commission have provoked. I have, owing to the chief responsibility which they incurred, as a result of the undisputed ascendancy they held over their subjects and followers, quoted extensively from the messages, the exhortations and warnings addressed to them by the Founders of our Faith, and expatiated on the consequences that have flowed from these momentous and epoch-making utterances.