Twenty years have passed, O kings, during which We have,
each day, tasted the agony of a fresh tribulation. No one of them that were
before Us hath endured the things We have endured. Would that ye could perceive
it! They that rose up against Us have put us to death, have shed our blood,
have plundered our property, and violated our honour. Though aware of most of
our afflictions, ye, nevertheless, have failed to stay the hand of the
aggressor. For is it not your clear duty to restrain the tyranny of the oppressor,
and to deal equitably with your subjects, that your high sense of justice may
be fully demonstrated to all mankind?
God hath committed into your hands the reins of the
government of the people, that ye may rule with justice over them, safeguard the
rights of the downtrodden, and punish the wrongdoers. If ye neglect the duty
prescribed unto you by God in His Book, your names shall be numbered with those
of the unjust in His sight. Grievous, indeed, will be your error. Cleave ye to
that which your imaginations have devised, and cast behind your backs the
commandments of God, the Most Exalted, the Inaccessible, the All-Compelling,
the Almighty? Cast away the things ye possess, and cling to that which God hath
bidden you observe. Seek ye His grace, for he that seeketh it treadeth His
straight Path.
- Baha’u’llah (Súriy-i-Mulúk [Tablet to Kings], ‘Summons of the
Lord of Hosts’)
When a true seeker determineth to take the step of search in
the path leading unto the knowledge of the Ancient of Days he… should forgive
the sinful, and never despise his low estate, for none knoweth what his own end
shall be. How often hath a sinner attained, at the hour of death, to the
essence of faith, and, quaffing the immortal draught, hath taken his flight
unto the Concourse on high! And how often hath a devout believer, at the hour
of his soul’s ascension, been so changed as to fall into the nethermost fire! 
