The Promised Day Is Come

And as we survey in other fields the decline in the fortunes of royalty, whether in the years immediately preceding the Great War or after, and contemplate the fate that has overtaken the Chinese Empire, the Portuguese and Spanish Monarchies, and more recently the vicissitudes that have afflicted, and are still afflicting, the sovereigns of Norway, of Denmark and of Holland, and observe the impotence of their fellow-sovereigns, and note the fear and trembling that has seized their thrones, may we not associate their plight with the opening passages of the Súriy-i-Mulúk, which, in view of their momentous significance, I feel impelled to quote a second time: “Fear God, O concourse of kings, and suffer not yourselves to be deprived of this most sublime grace…. Set your hearts towards the face of God, and abandon that which your desires have bidden you to follow, and be not of those who perish…. Ye examined not His [the Báb’s] Cause, when so to do had been better for you than all that the sun shineth upon, could ye but perceive it…. Beware that ye be not careless henceforth, as ye have been careless aforetime…. My face hath come forth from the veils, and shed its radiance upon all that is in heaven and on earth, and yet ye turned not towards Him…. Arise then … and make ye amends for that which hath escaped you…. If ye pay no heed unto the counsels which, in peerless and unequivocal language, We have revealed in this Tablet, Divine chastisement shall assail you from every direction, and the sentence of His justice shall be pronounced against you…. Twenty years have passed, O kings, during which We have, each day, tasted the agony of a fresh tribulation…. 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?”

No wonder that Bahá’u’lláh, in view of the treatment meted out to 71 Him by the sovereigns of the earth, should, as already quoted, have written these words: “From two ranks amongst men power hath been seized: kings and ecclesiastics.” Indeed, He even goes further, and states in His Tablet addressed to Shaykh Salmán: “One of the signs of the maturity of the world is that no one will accept to bear the weight of kingship. Kingship will remain with none willing to bear alone its weight. That day will be the day whereon wisdom will be manifested among mankind. Only in order to proclaim the Cause of God and spread abroad His Faith will anyone be willing to bear this grievous weight. Well is it with him who, for love of God and His Cause, and for the sake of God and for the purpose of proclaiming His Faith, will expose himself unto this great danger, and will accept this toil and trouble.”