Charles Alexander Eastman Quotes

We've searched our database for all the quotes and captions related to Charles Alexander Eastman. Here they are! All 18 of them:

β€œ
It was our belief that the love of possessions is a weakness to be overcome. . . . Children must early learn the beauty of generosity. They are taught to give what they prize most, that they may taste the happiness of giving. . . . The Indians in their simplicity literally give away all that they haveβ€”to relatives, to guests of other tribes or clans, but above all to the poor and the aged, from whom they can hope for no return.
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman
β€œ
The logical man must either deny all miracles or none.
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (The Soul of the Indian)
β€œ
The true Indian sets no price upon either his property or his labor. His generosity is limited only by his strength and ability. He regards it as an honor to be selected for difficult or dangerous service and would think it shameful to ask for any reward, saying rather: "Let the person I serve express his thanks according to his own bringing up and his sense of honor. Each soul must meet the morning sun, the new sweet earth, and the Great Silence alone!. What is Silence? It is the Great Mystery! The Holy Silence is His voice!
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (The Soul of the Indian)
β€œ
Friendship is held to be the severest test of character. It is easy, we think, to be loyal to a family and clan, whose blood is in your own veins.
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman
β€œ
One of the things that makes you feel good is to get out into natureβ€”go walking, go hiking, go swimming in the ocean, or wherever you live, in a river or a lake, experience the beauty of America, experience how America is such a sacred place. Everywhere you go in this land, our people have been there and they have said, β€œThis place is sacred.
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (Living in Two Worlds: The American Indian Experience (American Indian Traditions))
β€œ
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, astir 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
β€œ
To the untutored sage, the concentration of population was the prolific mother of all evils, moral no less than physical. He argued that food is good, while surfeit kills; that love is good, but lust destroys; and not less dreaded than the pestilence following upon crowded and unsanitary dwellings was the loss of spiritual power inseparable from too close contact with one's fellow-men.
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (The Soul of the Indian)
β€œ
I have not cared to pile up more dry bones, but to clothe them with flesh and blood.
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (The Soul of the Indian)
β€œ
It is simple truth that the Indian did not, so long as his native philosophy held sway over his mind, either envy or desire to imitate the splendid achievements of the white man. In his own thought he rose superior to them!
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (The Soul of the Indian)
β€œ
The religion of the Indian is the last thing about him that the man of another race will ever understand. First,
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (The Soul of the Indian)
β€œ
Let those I serve express their thanks according to their own upbringing and sense of honor. "The Wisdom of the Native Americans" By Kent Nerburn
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (Wigwam Evenings, Sioux Folk Tales Retold)
β€œ
Gradually it became known that the new race had a definite purpose, and that purpose was to chart and possess the whole country, regardless of the rights of its earlier inhabitants. Still the old chiefs cautioned their people to be patient, for, said they, the land is vast, both races can live on it, each in their own way. Let us therefore befriend them and trust their friendship. While they reasoned thus, the temptations of graft and self-aggrandizement overtook some of the leaders.
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains)
β€œ
Clear your mind of all dread and suspicion; this is the first step in the wilderness life. Think not the water will drown you, or that anything in the water or on land will bite or poison you. Have confidence in nature and yourself. Perhaps three-fourths of your physical failures are due to lack of nerve and will-power. It
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (Indian Scout Talks A Guide for Boy Scouts and Camp Fire Girls)
β€œ
The religion of the Indian is the last thing about him that the man of another race will ever understand. First, the Indian does not speak of these deep matters so long as he believes in them, and when he has ceased to believe he speaks inaccurately and slightingly. Second,
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (The Soul of the Indian)
β€œ
The native American has been generally despised by his white conquerors for his poverty and simplicity. They forget, perhaps, that his religion forbade the accumulation of wealth and the enjoyment of luxury. To him, as to other single-minded men in every age and race, from Diogenes to the brothers of Saint Francis, from the Montanists to the Shakers, the love of possessions has appeared a snare, and the burdens of a complex society a source of needless peril and temptation. Furthermore, it was the rule of his life to share the fruits of his skill and success with his less fortunate brothers.
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (The Soul of the Indian)
β€œ
The way of knowledge,” he continued, β€œis like our old way in hunting. You begin with a mere trail β€” a footprint. If you follow that faithfully, it may lead you to a clearer trail β€” a track β€” a road. Later on there will be many tracks, crossing and diverging one from the other. Then you must be careful, for success lies in the choice of the right road. You must be doubly careful, for traps will be laid for you, of which the most dangerous is the spirit-water, that causes a man to forget his self-respect
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (From the Deep Woods to Civilization)
β€œ
The first missionaries who came among us were good men, but they were imbued with the narrowness of their age. They branded us as pagans and devil-worshipers, and demanded that we renounce our gods as false. They even told us that we were eternally lost unless we adopted their faith and all its symbols. We of the twentieth century know better. We know that all religious aspiration, all sincere worship, can have but one source and goal. We know that the God of the educated and the God of the child, the God of the civilized and the God of the primitive, is after all the same God; and that this God does not measure our differences, but embraces all who live rightly and humbly on the earth. β€” Ohiyesa (Charles Alexander Eastman)
”
”
Kent Nerburn (The Wisdom of the Native Americans: Including The Soul of an Indian and Other Writings of Ohiyesa and the Great Speeches of Red Jacket, Chief Joseph, and Chief Seattle)
β€œ
The worship of the β€œGreat Mystery” was silent, solitary, free from all self-seeking. It was silent, because all speech is of necessity feeble and imperfect; therefore the souls of my ancestors ascended to God in wordless adoration. It was solitary, because they believed that He is nearer to us in solitude, and there were no priests authorized to come between a man and his Maker. None might exhort or confess or in any way meddle with the religious experience of another. Among us all men were created sons of God and stood erect, as conscious of their divinity. Our faith might not be formulated in creeds, nor forced upon any who were unwilling to receive it; hence there was no preaching, proselyting, nor persecution, neither were there any scoffers or atheists.
”
”
Charles Alexander Eastman (The Soul of the Indian)