Soon will your
swiftly-passing days be over, and the fame and riches, the comforts, the joys
provided by this rubbish-heap, the world, will be gone without a trace. Summon
ye, then, the people to God, and invite humanity to follow the example of the
Company on high. Be ye loving fathers to the orphan, and a refuge to the
helpless, and a treasury for the poor, and a cure for the ailing. Be ye the
helpers of every victim of oppression, the patrons of the disadvantaged. Think
ye at all times of rendering some service to every member of the human race.
Pay ye no heed to aversion and rejection, to disdain, hostility, injustice: act
ye in the opposite way. Be ye sincerely kind, not in appearance only.
- ‘Abdu'l-Baha (‘Selections from the Writings of Abdu'l-Baha’)
