Native America Quotes

We do not want churches. They will teach us to quarrel about God.

The land is sacred. These words are at the core of your being. The land is our mother, the rivers our blood. Take our land away and we die. That is, the Indian in us dies.

May the stars carry your sadness away, may the flowers fill your heart with beauty, may hope forever wipe away your tears. And, above all, may silence make you strong.

I salute the light within your eyes where the whole universe dwells. For when you are at that center within you and I am at that place within me, we shall be one.

I want my people to stay with me here. All the dead men will come to life again. Their spirits will come to their bodies again. We must wait here in the homes of our fathers and be ready to meet them in the bosom of our mother.

This war did not spring up on our land, this war was brought upon us by the children of the Great Father who came to take our land without a price, and who, in our land, do a great many evil things… This war has come from robbery – from the stealing of our land.

Birds make their nest in circles, for theirs is the same religion as ours.

He who would do great things should not attempt them all alone.

All men were made brothers. The earth is the mother of all people, and all people should have equal rights upon it. You might as well expect the rivers to run backward as that any man who was born free should be content when penned up and denied liberty to go where he pleases.

He put in your heart certain wishes and plans; in my heart he put other different desires.

I see a time of Seven Generations when all the colors of mankind will gather under the Sacred Tree of Life and the whole earth will become One Circle again.

Let me be a free man, free to travel, free to stop, free to work, free to trade where I choose, free to choose my own teachers, free to follow the religion of my fathers, free to talk, think and act for myself — and I will obey every law or submit to the penalty.

So long as mists envelop you, be still. Be still until the sunlight pours through and dispels the mists – as it surely will. Then act with courage.

We live, we die, and like the grass and trees, renew ourselves from the soft earth of the grave. Stones crumble and decay, faiths grow old and they are forgotten, but new beliefs are born. The faith of the villages is dust now… but it will grow again… like the trees.

The sky is round, and I have heard that the earth is round like a ball, and so are all the stars. The wind, in its greatest power, whirls. Birds make their nests in circles, for theirs is the same religion as ours.

All things are bound together. All things connect.

I will obey every law, or submit to the penalty.

Everything on the earth has a purpose, every disease and herb to cure it, and every person a mission. This is the Indian theory of existence.

Adolescents are in just as much trouble in Native America as they are in the white community.

Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view and demand that they respect yours.

As a child I understood how to give; I have forgotten this grace since I became civilized.

Always give a word or a sign of salute when meeting or passing a friend,even a stranger, when in a lonely place. Show respect to all people and grovel to none. When you arise in the morning give thanks for the food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself.

Let me be a free man – free to travel, free to stop, free to work.

The old Lakota was wise. He knew that man’s heart, away from nature, becomes hard; he knew that lack of respect for growing, living things soon led to lack of respect for humans too.

The earth was created by the assistance of the sun, and it should be left as it was. The country was made without lines of demarcation, and it is no man’s business to divide it.

All things are connected. Whatever befalls the Earth, befalls the children of the Earth.

A wee child toddling in a wonder world, I prefer to their dogma my excursions into the natural gardens where the voice of the Great Spirit is heard in the twittering of birds, the rippling of mighty waters, and the sweet breathing of flowers. If this is Paganism, then at present, at least, I am a Pagan.

Grown men may learn from very little children, for the hearts of little children are pure, and, therefore, the Great Spirit may show to them many things which older people miss.

It does not require many words to speak the truth.

If the Great Spirit had desired me to be a white man he would have made me so in the first place. He put in your heart certain wishes and plans, and in my heart he put other and different desires. It is not necessary for eagles to be crows.

[last words] What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night.

Hear me, my chiefs! I am tired. My heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever.

Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were. The life of a person is a circle from childhood to childhood, and so it is in everything where power moves.

Each man is good in the sight of the Great Spirit. It is not necessary for eagles to be crows. Now we are poor but we are free. No white man controls our footsteps. If we must die, we die defending our rights.

Everything an Indian does is in a circle, and that is because the power of the world always works in circles.

When someone was so poor that he couldn’t afford a horse, a tent or a blanket,
he would, in that case, receive it all as a gift.

Only to the white man was nature a ‘wilderness’.

The earth is the mother of all people, and all people should have equal rights upon it.

If a man loses anything and goes back and looks carefully for it, he will find it.

Where today are the Pequot? Where are the Narragansett, the Mohican, the Pcanet, and other powerful tribes of our people? They have vanished before the avarice and oppression of the white man, as snow before the summer sun.

I am a red man. If the Great Spirit had desired me to be a white man he would have made me so in the first place.

Abuse no one and no thing, for abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit of its vision.

Man’s heart away from nature becomes hard.

You ask me to plow the ground. Shall I take a knife and tear my mother’s bosom? Then when I die she will not take me to her bosom to rest.

The voice of the Great Spirit is heard in the twittering of birds, the rippling of mighty waters, and the sweet breathing of flowers.

Is it wrong for me to love my own? Is it wicked for me because my skin is red? Because I am Sioux? Because I was born where my father lived? Because I would die for my people and my country?

We know our lands have now become more valuable. The white people think we do not know their value; but we know that the land is everlasting, and the few goods we receive for it are soon worn out and gone.

We do not want riches, we want peace and love.

When the Earth is sick, the animals will begin to disappear, when that happens, The Warriors of the Rainbow will come to save them.

Children must early learn the the beauty of generosity. They are taught to give what they prize most, that they may taste the happiness of giving.

Old age is not as honorable as death, but most people seek it.

We are going by you without fighting if you will let us, but we are going by you anyhow!

Our fathers gave us many laws which they had learned from their
fathers. These laws were good.

There is no death, only a change of worlds.

At the center of the universe dwells the Great Spirit. And that center is really everywhere. It is within each of us.

Where no one intrudes, many can live in harmony.

Out of the Indian approach to life there came a great freedom, an intense and absorbing respect for life, enriching faith in a Supreme Power, and principles of truth, honesty, generosity, equity, and brotherhood as a guide to mundane relations.

Sing your death song and die like a hero going home.

If you talk to the animals they will talk with you and you will know each other. If you do not talk to them you will not know them and what you do not know, you will fear. What one fears, one destroys.

When your time comes to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song, and die like a hero going home.

We did not think of the great open plains, the beautiful rolling hills, and winding streams with tangled growth as wild. Earth was beautiful and we were surrounded with the blessings of the Great Mystery.

Help me always to speak the truth quietly, to listen with an open mind when others speak, and to remember the peace that may be found in silence.

If we must die, we die defending our rights.

Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide.

Treat the earth well: it was not given to you by your parents, it was loaned to you by your children. We do not inherit the Earth from our Ancestors, we borrow it from our Children.

Each man is good in His sight. It is not necessary for eagles to be crows.

It is through this mysterious power that we too have our being, and we therefore yield to our neighbors, even to our animal neighbors, the same right as ourselves to inhabit this vast land.

Now that we are poor, we are free. No white man controls our footsteps.

If the white man wants to live in peace with the Indian, he can live in peace. There need be no trouble. Treat all men alike. give them all the same law. Give them all an even chance to live and grow.

I was born where there were no enclosures.

The old people came literally to love the soil and they sat or reclined on the ground with a feeling of being close to a mothering power. The soil was soothing, strengthening, cleansing and healing.

We learned to be patient observers like the owl. We learned cleverness from the crow, and courage from the jay, who will attack an owl ten times its size to drive it off its territory. But above all of them ranked the chickadee because of its indomitable spirit.