The Seven Valleys and the Four Valleys
CONTENTS Baha'i Terms of Use The Seven Valleys of Baha'u'llah The Valley of Search The Valley of Love The Valley of Knowledge The Valley of Unity The Valley of Contentment The Valley of Wonderment The Valley of True Poverty and Absolute Nothingness The Four Valleys The Four Valleys The First Valley The Second Valley The Third Valley The Fourth Valley
"AND ANGELS CAME--"
BY ANNE O'HAGAN
The full effulgence of cloudless midsummer enveloped the place. The
lawns, bright and soft, sloped for half a mile to the sweetbrier
hedge. Among them wound the drive, now and again crossing the stone
bridges of the small, curving lake which gave the estate its affected
name--Lakeholm. To the left of the house a coppice of bronze beeches
shone with dark lustre; clumps of rhododendrons enlivened the green
with splashes of color. Lombardy poplars, with their gibbetlike
erectness, bordered the roads and intersected them with mathematical
shadows; here and there rose a feathery elm or a maple of
wide-branched beauty. To the right, a shallow fall of terraces led to
the Italian garden, Mrs. Dinsmore's chief pride, now a glory of
matched and patterned color and a dazzle of spray from marble basins.
Beyond all the careful, exotic beauty of the place, the wide valley
dipped away, alternate meadow and grove, until it met the silvery
shiver of willows marking the course of the river. Beyond that again,
CONTENTS Baha'i Terms of Use The Seven Valleys of Baha'u'llah The Valley of Search The Valley of Love The Valley of Knowledge The Valley of Unity The Valley of Contentment The Valley of Wonderment The Valley of True Poverty and Absolute Nothingness The Four Valleys The Four Valleys The First Valley The Second Valley The Third Valley The Fourth Valley