How to “attract divine bounties”

Endeavor to keep your hearts sanctified and your intentions pure so that you may attract divine bounties. Remember, although the sun shines equally on all things, yet in the mirror its effulgence is intense, and not in the dark stone. The cause of this intensity and heat in the glass is its purity; without purity and cleanliness, these effects would never appear in it. Similarly, if rain fall on barren land, it produces nothing, but if it fall on pure fertile land, it makes it verdant and causes it to yield a harvest. This is the day in which only pure and chaste hearts can derive benefit from the eternal bounties and only pious souls can receive light from the ever-existent splendors. (‘Abdu’l-Baha, excerpt from a talk given during His last day in Chicago, The Diary of Mirza Mahmud-i-Zarqani, p. 80) (To see the entire talk please visit Talks of ‘Abdu’l-Baha)