It is essential that scholars and the spiritually learned
should undertake in all sincerity and purity of intent and for the sake of God
alone, to counsel and exhort the masses and clarify their vision with that
collyrium which is knowledge. For today the people out of the depths of their
superstition, imagine that any individual who believes in God and His signs,
and in the Prophets and Divine Revelations and laws, and is a devout and
God-fearing person, must of necessity remain idle and spend his days in sloth,
so as to be considered in the sight of God as one who has forsaken the world
and its vanities, set his heart on the life to come, and isolated himself from
human beings in order to draw nearer to God. (‘Abdu’l-Baha, ‘The Secret of
Divine Civilization’)
