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Native Pride Wisdom
History and Stories from Native Americans
Book I
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Quotes From
American Indians
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FiredogCheyenne
"We are part fire, and part dream.
We are the physical mirroring
of Miaheyyun, the Total Universe, upon
this earth, our Mother.
We are here to experience.
We are a movement of a hand within millions of seasons,
a wink of touching within millions and millions of
sun fires. And we speak with the mirroring of the sun."
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Oren Lyons Times change but principles don't. Times change but lands do not. Times change but our cultures and our languages remain the same.
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Twylah Nitsch, Seneca Look at your
neighbor and make him sparkle.
Your eyes
are the mirror of your soul.
When you sparkle your eyes,
whether you think
you are beautiful or not,
you are.
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Audrey Shenandoah When the Earth was created with all of its living beings, the intention of the Great Spirit was not to make it livable for men only. We were placed in the world together with our brothers and sisters, with those that have four legs, with those that fly and with those that swim. All of these forms of life, even the tiniest blade of grass and the largest of the trees, form with us a big family. We are all brothers and are equally important on this Earth.
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Buffalo Child Long Lance Sioux
We respected our old people above all others in the tribe.
To live to be so old they must have been brave
and strong, and good fighters, and we aspired to be like them.
We never allowed our old people to want for anything...
We looked upon our old people as demigods of a kind,
and we loved them deeply. They were all our fathers.
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Charles Alexandar Eastman The first American mingled with his pride a singular humility. Spiritual arrogance was foreign to his nature and teaching.
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Cochise You must speak straight so that your works may go as sunlight into our hearts.
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Black Hawk How smooth must be the language of the whites when they can make right look like wrong, and wrong like right.
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Chief Luther Standing Bear Silence was meaningful with the Lakota, and his granting a space of silence before talking was done in the practice of true politeness and regardful of the rule that "thought comes before speech."
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Geronimo Sometimes we prayed in silence; sometimes each prayed aloud; sometimes an aged person prayed for all of us. At other times one would rise and speak to us of our duties to each other and to Usen. Our services were short.
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Red Cloud Look at me.... I am poor and naked, but I am the chief of the nation. We do not want riches, but we do want to train our children right. Riches would do us no good. We could not take them with us to the other world. We do not want riches. We want peace and love.
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Sioux Proverb A people without a history is like wind on the buffalo grass.
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Ten Bears Great Spirit I want no blood upon my land to stain the grass. I want it all clear and pure, and I wish it so, that all who go though among my people may find it peacful when they come, and leave peacefully when they go.
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George Copway I was born in natures wild domain! The trees were all that sheltered my infant limbs, the blue heavens all that covered me. I am one of Nature's children. I have always admired her. She shall be my glory: her features, her robes, and the wreath about her brow, the seasons, her stately oaks, and the evergreen ... her hair, ringlets over the earth ... all contribute to my enduring love of her.
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Ohiyesa (Charles Alexander Eastman) -Wahpeton Santee Sioux
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 shining pool - his, in the mind of the unlettered sage, is the ideal attitude and conduct of life. Silence is the cornerstone of character.
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Wovoka Grandfather says that when your friends die you must not cry. You must not hurt anybody or do harm to anyone. You must not fight. Do right always. It will give you satisfaction in life.
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Black HawkWe have men among us, like the whites, who pretend to know the right path, but will not consent to show it without pay! I have no faith in their paths, but believe that every man must make his own path!
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Satanta I love the land and the buffalo and will not part with it... I want the children raised as I was .... I don't want to settle, I love to roam over the prairies. There I feel free and happy, but when we settle down we grow pale and die.
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Wallace Black Elk If those bad words come, I let them come in one ear and go out the other. I never let them come out of my mouth. If a bad word comes in your ear and then comes out of your mouth, it will go someplace and hurt somebody. If I did that, that hurt would come back twice as hard on me."
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Piapot The white man who is our agent is so stingy that he carries a linen rag in his pocket into which to blow his nose, for fear he might blow away something of value.
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Chief Joseph The character of the Indian's emotion left little room in his heart for antagonism toward his fellow creatures.....For the Lakota, mountains, lakes, rivers, springs, valleys, and woods were all finished beauty. Winds, rain, snow sunshine, day, night, and change of seasons were endlessly fascinating. Birds, insects, and animals filled the world with knowledge that defied the comprehension of man.
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Sitting Bull When I was a boy, the Sioux owned the world. The sun rose and set on their land; they sent ten thousand men to battle. Where are the warriors today? Who slew them? Where are our lands? Who owns them? What white man can say I ever stole his land or a penny of his money? Yet they say I am a thief. What white woman, however lonely, was ever captive or insulted by me? Yet they say I am a bad Indian. What white has ever seen me drunk? Who has ever come to me hungry and left me unfed? Who has ever seen me beat my wives or abuse my children? what law have I broken? Is it wrong for me to love my own? Is it wicked for me because my skin is red? Because I am a Sioux? Because I was born where my father lived? Because I would die for my people and my country?
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Black Elk Hear me, four quarters of the world... a relative I am! Give me the strength to walk the soft earth, a relative to all that is! Give me the eyes to see and the strength to understand, that I may be like you. With your power only can I face the winds.
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Four Guns Many of the white mans ways are past our understanding.... They put a great store upon writing; there is always a paper.
The white people must think paper has some mysterious power to help them in the world. The Indian needs no writings; words that are true sink deep into his heart, where they remain. He never forgets them. On the other hand, if the white man loses his papers, he is helpless. I once heard one of their preachers say that no white man was admitted to heaven unless there were writings about him in a great book!
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Chief Joseph We were taught to believe that the Great Spirit sees and hears everything, and that he never forgets; that hereafter he will give every man a spirit-home according to his deserts ... This I believe, and all my people believe the same.
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Mourning Dove ..... everything on the earth has a propose,every disease an herb to cure it,and every person a mission. This is the Indian theory of existence.
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Chief JosephI have carried a heavy load on my back ever since I was a boy.
I realized then that we could not hold our own with the white men. We were like deer. They were like grizzly bears. We had a small country. Their country was large. We were contented to let things remain as the Great Spirit Chief made them They were not, and would change the rivers and mountains if they did not suit them.
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Luther Standing Bear The American Indian is of the soil, weather it be the region of forests, plains, pueblos or mesas. He fits into the landscape, for the hand that fashioned the continent also fashioned the man for his surroundings. He once grew as naturally as the wild sunflowers; he belongs just as the buffalo belonged.
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Four Guns Oglala Sioux
I have attended dinners among white people. Their ways are not our ways, We eat in silence, quietly smoke a pipe, and depart. Thus is our host honored. This is not the way of the white man. After his food has been eaten, one is expected to say foolish things. Then the host feels honored.
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White Shield The color of the skin makes no difference. What is good and just for one is good and just for the other, and the Great Spirit made all men brothers. I have red skin, but my grandfather was a white man. What does it matter? It is not the color of the skin that makes me good or bad.
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Big Elk Do not grieve. Misfortunes will happen to the wisest of men. Death will come, always out of season. It is the command of the Great Spirit, and all nations and people must obey. What is past and what cannot be prevented should not be grieved for.... Misfortunes do not flourish particularly in our lives ... they grow everywhere.
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Black Elk You have noticed that everything as Indian does is in a circle, and that is because the Power of the World always works in circles, and everything tries to be round..... 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, for theirs is the same religion as ours... Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were. The life of a man is a circle from childhood to childhood, and so it is in everything where power moves.
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Many Horses Oglala
I will follow the white man's trail. I will make him my friend, but I will not bend my back to his burdens. I will be cunning as a coyote. I will ask him to help me understand his ways, then I will prepare the way for my children. Maybe they will outrun the white man in his own shoes. There are but two ways for us. One leads to hunger and death, the other leads so where the poor white man lives. Beyond is the happy hunting ground where the white man
cannot go.
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~Native Pride Wisdom~
© 2001
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Background Image:
"Gift of the Eagle Feather" by Howard Terpning, Jr.
Adapted to web background by Ani Bealaura
Copyright: 2001, All Rights Reserved
Divider Bars designed by Ani Bealaura
Copyright: 2001, All Rights Reserved
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