im and fresh afflictions and cares beset Him. One of
them: after having suffered intense vicissitudes, He was made homeless and
a wanderer and fell a victim to still new vexations and troubles. In
'Iraq, the Day-Star of the world was so exposed to the wiles of the people
of malice as to be eclipsed in splendor. Later on He was sent an exile to
the Great City (Constantinople) and thence to the Land of Mystery
(Adrianople), whence, grievously wronged, He was eventually transferred to
the Most Great Prison (Akka). He Whom the world hath wronged (may my life
be offered up for His loved ones) was four times banished from city to
city, till at last, condemned to perpetual confinement, He was
incarcerated in this prison, the prison of highway robbers, of brigands
and of man-slayers. All this is but one of the trials that have afflicted
the Blessed Beauty, the rest being even as grievous as this.

And still another of His trials was the hostility, the flagrant injustice,
the iniquity and rebellion of Mirza Yahya. Although that Wronged One, that
Prisoner, had through His loving-kindness nurtured him in His own bosom
ever since his early years, had showered at every moment His tender care
upon him, exalted his name, shielded him from every misfortune, endeared
him to them of this world and the next, and despite the firm exhortations
and counsels of His Holiness, the Exalted One (the Bab) and His clear and
conclusive warning;--"Beware, beware, lest the Nineteen Letters of the
Living and that which hath been revealed in the Bayan veil thee!" yet
notwithstanding this, Mirza Yahya denied Him, dealt falsely with Him,
believed Him not, sowed the seeds of doubt, closed his eyes to His
manifest verses and turned aside therefrom. Would that he had been content
therewith! Nay, he even attempted to shed the sacred blood (of
Baha'u'llah) and then raised a great clamor and tumult around him,
attributing unto Baha'u'llah malevolence and cruelty towards himself. What
sedition he stirred up and what a storm of mischief he raised whilst in
the Land of Mystery (Adrianople)! At last, he wrought that which caused
the Day-Star of the world to be sent an exile to this, the Most Great
Prison, and sorely wronged, and in the West of this Great Prison He did
set.

O ye that stand fast and firm in the Covenant! The Center of Sedition, the
Prime Mover of mischief, Mirza Muhammad 'Ali, hath passed out from under
the shadow of the Cause, hath broken the Coven