Life of Ahmad — Page 6
THE MIGHTY HOUR as 6 Though blessed with all the achievements of a veritable golden age, it faces staggering problems that baffle its wisest sons. Perilous indeed are the times in which we live. Mighty forces have been unleashed and, like untamed beasts, are stampeding through the earth defying the control of men. Gigantic, world-embracing movements are on foot, some for good, and many for evil. Events of the first magnitude follow one another with dazzling rapidity. Everything happens on a huge, unprecedented scale. The pace is terrific. ' In this epoch of unprecedented disintegration— economic, political, moral, social and religious—the holy flames kindled by the Prophets of God throughout the ages have all been quenched in the blood of man; and the ceaseless wrangling of the various contending forces has sucked the life-blood from the very hearts of men and nations. In a recent Encyclical the Pope declared the present crisis to be 'Perhaps the most serious and widespread since the Deluge. ' It appears God is again saying to a Noah: 'The end of all flesh is come before Me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth. ' 'We are living', said Mr. H. G. Wells, in an address at the London School of Economics, 'in a civilisation which is very rapidly going to pieces … Just as in the time of Noah as , when the flood came, we must build an Ark amid the waste of ruin that is around us. '