Portals to Freedom - Paperback

Portals To Freedom By HOWARD COLBY IVES With Four Portraits of Abdul-Bahd and a picture of The Bahdi House of Worship Issued in Commemoration of the 25th Anniversary of Abdul-Bahas Visit to the United States of America April to December, 1912 New York E. P. BUTTON COMPANY Publishers Abdu 1-Bahi Washington, D. C., 1912 To SHOGHI EFFENDI The Grandson of ABDUL-BAHA By Him Appointed Guardian of the Bahai Faith and Head of the International House of Justice This book is lovingly dedicated TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction PAGE 13 Chapter One Chapter Tivo Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Retrospect. Spiritual Bankruptcy. A Dawn ing Hope. The Golden Silence 1 8 The Glance that saved the World. A Divine Sincerity. The Masterly Teaching Method. 34 True Wealth, Power and Freedom. The Table of Abdu 1-Baha. Very Great Things. Are you interested in Renunciation . . 50 The Attraction of Perfection. The Boys from the Bowery. A Black Rose and a Black Sweet 60 A Leaf in the Breeze of the Will of God. My Throne is My Mat. Inscription in The Seven Valleys. 69 The Reality and Essence of Brotherhood. Cannot you serve him Once True Brotherhood due to the Breaths of the Holy Spirit. O, you should have Seen Him . 80 An Eternal Bond. The Wedding. The need for Reformation of Laws pertaining to Di vorce. The Laws of BahaUllah. Four Kinds of Love. The Children of the New Day 92 The Most Perfect Gentleman I have ever known. The Master Teacher. The Spir itual Warrior. A Fable. It behooves you to manifest Light. The Gift. The First Tablet 114 7 Table of Contents PAGE Chapter Nine Chapter Ten The American Itinerary. The Power of the Spirit. Her Highness the Cow. TrueGreatness. The Divine Teaching Method. 132 The Universe of BahaUllah. The Evolu tion of Man. The Glory of Self-sacrifice. 149 Chapter Instruction in the Way of Life. What is Eleven Authority The Science of the Love of God. . 167 Chapter The New World Order. A Divine Civili-Tivelve zation. The Kingdom of God on Earth. . 175 Chapter Some Divine Characteristics. The Humil-Thlrteen ity of Servitude. The Station of True Man hood 192 Chapter Abdul-Bahas Last Words in America. Fourteen Seven Distinctive Characteristics of the Teachings. Evidences of the New World Order 211 Chapter By their Fruits shall ye know them. Four Fifteen Tablets 229 Chapter Conclusion 250 Sixteen ILLUSTRATIONS ABDUL-BAHA, WASHINGTON, D. C, 1912 Frontispiece ABDUL-BAHA, WASHINGTON, D. C, 1912 Facing Page 84 THE BAHAI HOUSE OF WORSHIP AT WILMETTE, ILLINOIS, ON LAKE MICHIGAN Facing Page 190 ABDUL-BAHA IN THE GARDEN OF BAHJI Facing Page 211 ABDUL-BAHA STANDING BEFORE HIS HOME HAIFA, PALESTINE Facing Page 248 Portals To Freedom INTRODUCTION I ask Thee, O Ruler of Existence and King of Creation, to transmute the brass of existence into gold by the elixir of Thy Revelation and Wisdom then reveal unto men by a comprehensive Book that which will enrich them by Thy Riches. BahaUllah. WHAT is that mystery underlying human life which gives to events and to persons the power of mutation, of transformation If one had never before seen a seed, nor heard of its latent life, how difficult to believe that only the cold earth, the warm sun, the descending showers and the gardeners care were needed to cause its miraculous transformation into the growing form, the budding beauty, the intoxicating fragrance of the rose Or who can understandthe reason why a chance perusal of a book, the presence of a friend or the meeting with a stranger often alters a determined course of action, profoundly affects our attitude toward life, and, not seldom, so nearly reaches the roots of being and the springs of action that never after is life quite the same It is as if some super-Luther Burbank had, by that 13