The morals of the members of this dwindling community, no less than their numbers, had sharply declined. Such was their “waywardness and folly,” to quote Bahá’u’lláh’s own words, that upon His release from prison, His first decision was “to arise … and undertake, with the utmost vigor, the task of regenerating this people.”
- Shoghi Effendi (‘God Passes By’, chapter 7)