Whatever resistance the Bábís offered, here or elsewhere,
proved ineffective. They were overwhelmed by numbers. The Báb Himself was taken
from His cell and executed. Of His chief disciples who avowed their belief in
Him, not one soul was left alive save Bahá’u’lláh, who with His family and a
handful of devoted followers was driven destitute into exile and prison in a
foreign land.
But the fire, though smothered, was not quenched. It burned
in the hearts of the exiles who carried it from country to country as they
travelled. Even in the homeland of Persia it had penetrated too deeply to be
extinguished by physical violence, and still smouldered in the people’s hearts,
needing only a breath from the spirit to be fanned into an all-consuming
conflagration.
- Shoghi Effendi (‘Introduction to ‘The Dawn-Breakers’)
