Native Wisdom Quotes - Page 2

• 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.

  Mourning Dove

  Native American, Marijuana, Purpose

  Mourning Dove (1994). “Mourning Dove: A Salishan Autobiography”, p.69, U of Nebraska Press

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• 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.

  Sitting Bull

  Native American, Heart, Men

  "I have spoken; American history through the voices of the Indians". Book by Virginia Armstrong, Chicago, Sage Books, 1971.

  212 Copy quote

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

  Black Elk

  Peace, Native American, Oneness

  164 Copy quote

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

  Seneca the Younger

  Native American, American Indian, All Alone

  9 Copy quote

• 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.

  Chief White Eagle

  Native American, Long, Pieces

  18 Copy quote

• I saw more than I can tell / And I understood more than I saw.

  Black Elk

  Native American, Circles, Shapes

  Black Elk (2000). “Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux”, Bison Books

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

  Crowfoot

  Sunset, Native American, Firefly

  "Aging in the Modern World: Selections from the Literature of Aging for Pleasure and Instruction". Book by ‎Clark Tibbitts, p. 222, 1957.

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• So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and its purpose in the service of your people. Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide.

  Tecumseh

  Song, Love You, Native American

  "A Sourcebook for Earth's Community of Religions". Book by Joel Diederik Beversluis, 1993.

  177 Copy quote

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• The beauty of the trees, the softness of the air, the fragrance of the grass, they speak to me. The summit of the mountain, the thunder of the sky, the rhythm of the sea, speaks to me. The faintness of the stars, the freshness of the morning, the dewdrop on the flower, speaks to me. The strength of the fire, the taste of the salmon, the trail of the sun, and the life that never goes away, they speak to me. And my heart soars.

  Chief Dan George

  Morning, Nature, Stars

  Chief Dan George, “My Heart Soars”

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• 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.

  Chief Joseph

  Native American, Dust, Tree

  114 Copy quote

• The Wise Man believes profoundly in silence - the sign of a perfect equilibrium. Silence is the absolute poise or balance of body, mind and spirit. The man who preserves his selfhood ever calm and unshaken by the storms of existence - not a leaf, as it were, astire on the tree, not a ripple upon the surface of the shinning pool-his, in the mind of the unlettered sage, is the ideal attitude and conduct of life. Silence is the cornerstone of character.

  Charles Alexander Eastman

  Wise, Attitude, Believe

  62 Copy quote

• Where no one intrudes, many can live in harmony.

  Chief Dan George

  Native American, Harmony, American Indian

  146 Copy quote

• Our religion is the traditions of our ancestors - the dreams of our old men, given them in solemn hours of the night by the Great Spirit; and the visions of our sachems, and is written in the hearts of our people.

  Chief Seattle

  Dream, Native American, Heart

  12 Copy quote

• We do not want churches because they will teach us to quarrel about God. We do not want to learn that. We may quarrel with men sometimes about things on this earth, but we never quarrel about the Great Spirit. We do not want to learn that.

  Chief Joseph

  Men, Justice, Diversity

  210 Copy quote

• Only to the white man was nature a 'wilderness'.

  Luther Standing Bear

  Native American, Men, White Man

  Luther Standing Bear (2006). “Land of the Spotted Eagle”, p.38, U of Nebraska Press

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• 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.

  Spotted Tail

  Children, Father, Spring

  78 Copy quote

• Everything the Power of the World does is done in a circle.

  Black Elk

  Native American, Circles, Doe

  "The Sacred Pipe : Black Elk's Account of the Seven Rites of the Oglala Sioux" recorded and edited by Joseph Epes Brown, (Ch. 17), 1961.

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• Traditional people of Indian nations have interpreted the two roads that face the light-skinned race as the road to technology and the road to spirituality. We feel that the road to technology.... has led modern society to a damaged and seared earth. Could it be that the road to technology represents a rush to destruction, and that the road to spirituality represents the slower path that the traditional native people have traveled and are now seeking again? The earth is not scorched on this trail. The grass is still growing there.

  William Commanda

  Native American, Technology, Two

  48 Copy quote

• Everything the Power of the World does is done in a circle. 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 nest in circles... The sun comes forth and goes down again in a circle. The moon does the same and both are round. Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were.

  John Neihardt

  Stars, Native American, Moon

  "Black Elk Speaks : being the life story of a holy man of the Ogalala Sioux" by John Neihardt, (Ch. 17), 1961.

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• Our land is everything to us.... I will tell you one of the things we remember on our land. We remember that our grandfathers paid for it - with their lives.

  John Wooden

  Native American, Land, Grandparent

  8 Copy quote

• Man's heart away from nature becomes hard.

  Standing Bear

  Inspirational, Life, Nature

  68 Copy quote

• My young men shall never work, men who work cannot dream; and wisdom comes to us in dreams. You ask me to plow the ground. Shall I take a knife and tear my mothers breast? Then when I die she will not take me to her bosom to rest. You ask me to dig for stone. Shall I dig under her skin for her bones? Then when I die I cannot enter her body to be born again. You ask me to cut grass and make hay and sell it and be rich like white men. But how dare I cut off my mother's hair.

  Smohalla

  Dream, Mother, Native American

  "Wisdom of the North American Indian in speech and legend". Book by Alexander Francis Chamberlain, 1913.

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• Knowledge was inherent in all things. The world was a library.

  Luther Standing Bear

  Knowledge, Library, World

  Luther Standing Bear (2006). “Land of the Spotted Eagle”, p.194, U of Nebraska Press

  69 Copy quote

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• The earth is our mother. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons of earth. If men spit upon the ground, they spit upon themselves.

  Chief Seattle

  Mother, Son, Men

  Seattle (Chief) (1976). “Chief Seattle's Testimony”

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

  Chief Joseph

  Religion, Church, Want

  24 Copy quote