Examine Our Cause, [“O kings of the earth”] inquire into the
things that have befallen Us, and decide justly between Us and Our enemies, and
be ye of them that act equitably towards their neighbour. If ye stay not the hand of the oppressor, if
ye fail to safeguard the rights of the downtrodden, what right have ye then to
vaunt yourselves among men? What is it
of which ye can rightly boast? Is it on
your food and your drink that ye pride yourselves, on the riches ye lay up in
your treasuries, on the diversity and the cost of the ornaments with which ye
deck yourselves? If true glory were to
consist in the possession of such perishable things, then the earth on which ye
walk must needs vaunt itself over you, because it supplieth you, and bestoweth
upon you, these very things, by the decree of the Almighty. In its bowels are contained, according to
what God hath ordained, all that ye possess.
From it, as a sign of His mercy, ye derive your riches. Behold then your state, the thing in which ye
glory! Would that ye could perceive
it!
- Baha’u’llah (‘Summons of the Lord of
Hosts’)
