It is related that His Holiness Christ -- May my life be a
sacrifice to Him! -- one day, accompanied by His apostles, passed by the corpse
of a dead animal. One of them said: 'How putrid has this animal become!' The
other exclaimed: 'How it is deformed!' A third cried out: 'What a stench! How
cadaverous looking!' but His Holiness Christ said: "Look at its teeth! how
white they are!' Consider, that He did not look at all at the defects of that
animal; nay, rather, He searched well until He found the beautiful white teeth.
He observed only the whiteness of the teeth and overlooked entirely the
deformity of the body, the dissolution of its organs and the bad odour.
This is the attribute of the children of the Kingdom. This
is the conduct and the manner of the real Bahá'ís. I hope that all the
believers will attain to this lofty station."
- 'Abdu'l-Bahá (Tablet to Dr. M.G. Skinner, August 12,
1913: Star of the West, Vol. IV, No. 11; compilation: ‘Lights of Guidance’)
