One day walking down the mountain, Bahá’u’lláh heard the sound of crying, and there was a little boy, why was he weeping so bitterly? “Oh Sir! The schoolmaster has punished me for writing so badly! And now I have nothing to copy, and I cannot write and I dare not go back to school!” Bahá’u’lláh sat with the boy, wrote a him a copy and tenderly taught him how to imitate it. The little by ran off greatly excited and pushed the writing into the hands of the schoolmaster. When the schoolmaster saw the writing he was astonished. ‘From whence did you get this?” He asked in amazement, “He wrote it for me, the dervish on the mountain” the boy replied, “But this is exquisite penmanship! He is no dervish who wrote this, but a royal personage!” And so it was that the people heard this story and became curious about the dervish, alone on the mountains. And the Sufis there had dreams about Him and sought Him out and asked Him many impossible questions, and He answered them all, and their love and respect for ‘the nameless one’ knew no bounds.
Deeds not Words
On the evening of the same day ‘Abdu’l-Bahá spoke briefly again to a group of Bahá’í friends of the subject which, on these last days seemed very close to His heart and lips - the station to which those who had accepted the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh were called and expected to attain by the very fact that they had accepted them. I remember, in this connection, a story told me by one of the friends present at a meeting of the executive committee of the New York Spiritual Assembly. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had been asked to be present. After listening to their deliberations for a half-hour or so He calmly arose to leave. At the door He paused a moment and surveyed the faces turned towards Him. After a moment of silence He said, that He had been told that this was a meeting of the executive committee. "Yes, Master," said the Chairman. Then why do you not execute. Always was His emphasis upon deeds: and deeds of such quality and purity as seemed, to those who listened, unattainable. Nevertheless there was no lowering of the standard. And He set the example. There was no doubt of that. Like the true Leader He never called upon His followers to go where He had not blazed the Path.
