, a commotion still more devastating than
it has yet produced?

The dramatic collapse of both the Third Empire and the Napoleonic dynasty,
the virtual extinction of the temporal sovereignty of the Supreme Pontiff,
in the lifetime of Baha'u'llah, were but the precursors of still greater
catastrophes that may be said to have marked the ministry of 'Abdu'l-Baha.
The forces unleashed by a conflict, the full significance of which still
remains unfathomed, and which may be considered as a prelude to this, the
most devastating of all wars, can well be regarded as the occasion of
these dreadful catastrophes. The progress of the War of 1914-18 dethroned
the House of Romanov, while its termination precipitated the downfall of
both the Hapsburg and Hohenzollern dynasties.

THE RISE OF BOLSHEVISM

The rise of Bolshevism, born amidst the fires of that inconclusive
struggle, shook the throne of the Czars and overthrew it. Alexander II
Nicolaevich, whom Baha'u'llah had commanded in His Tablet to "arise ...
and summon the nations unto God," who had been thrice warned: "beware lest
thy desire deter thee from turning towards the face of thy Lord," "beware
lest thou barter away this sublime station," "beware lest thy sovereignty
withhold thee from Him Who is the Supreme Sovereign," was not indeed the
last of the Czars to rule his country, but rather the inaugurator of a
retrogressive policy which in the end proved fatal to both himself and his
dynasty.

In the latter part of his reign he initiated a reactionary policy which,
causing widespread disillusionment, gave rise to Nihilism, which, as it
spread, ushered in a period of terrorism of unexampled violence, leading
in its turn to several attempts on his life, and culminating in his
assassination. Stern repression guided the policy of his successor,
Alexander III, who "assumed an attitude of defiant hostility to innovators
and liberals." The tradition of unqualified absolutism, of extreme
religious orthodoxy was maintained by the still more severe Nicolas II,
the last of the Czars, who, guided by the counsels of a man who was "the
very incarnation of a narrow-minded, stiff-necked despotism," and aided by
a corrupt bureaucracy, and humiliated by the disastrous effects of a
foreign war, increased the general discontent of the masses, both
intellectuals and peasants. Driven for a time into subterranean channels,
and intensified by military reverses, it exploded at last in the m