I cured with the power that came through me. Of course, it was not I who cured,it was the power from the Outer World.
BLACK ELKA good nation I will make live.This the nation above has said.They have given me the power to make over.
More Black Elk Quotes
-
-
I was four years old then, and I think it must have been the next summer that I first heard the voices.
BLACK ELK -
Also, as I lay there thinking of my vision, I could see it all again and feel the meaning with a part of me like a strange power glowing in my body; but when the part of me that talks would try to make words for the meaning, it would be like fog and get away from me.
BLACK ELK -
Everywhere is the center of the world. Everything is sacred.
BLACK ELK -
I cured with the power that came through me.
BLACK ELK -
And when I breathed, my breath was lightning.
BLACK ELK -
And as he spoke of understanding, I looked up and saw the rainbow leap with flames of many colors over me.
BLACK ELK -
It is in the darkness of their eyes that men lose their way.
BLACK ELK -
Let every step you take upon the earth be as a prayer.
BLACK ELK -
He who is well prepared is he who knows that he is nothing compared with Wakan-Tanka, who is everything; then he knows that world which is real.
BLACK ELK -
Birds make their nests in circles, for theirs is the same religion as ours.
BLACK ELK -
The hawk swoops down on its prey, so does the Indian. In his lament he is like an animal.
BLACK ELK -
It may be that some little root of the sacred tree still lives. Nourish it then, that it may leaf and bloom and fill with singing birds.
BLACK ELK -
They told me I had been sick twelve days, lying like dead all the while, and that Whirlwind Chaser, who was Standing Bear’s uncle and a medicine man, had brought me back to life.
BLACK ELK -
Now suddenly there was nothing but a world of cloud, and we three were there alone in the middle of a great white plain with snowy hills and mountains staring at us; and it was very still; but there were whispers.
BLACK ELK -
Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were.
BLACK ELK -
And I saw that the sacred hoop of my people as one of many hoops that made one circle.
BLACK ELK -
It is hard to follow one great vision in this world of darkness and of many changing shadows. Among those men get lost.
BLACK ELK -
The life of an Indian is like the wings of the air. That is why you notice the hawk knows how to get his prey. The Indian is like that.
BLACK ELK -
Crazy Horse dreamed and went into the world where there is nothing but the spirits of things. That is the real world that is behind this one, and everything we see here is something like a shadow from that world….
BLACK ELK -
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.
BLACK ELK -
The life of a person is a circle from childhood to childhood, and so it is in everything where power moves.
BLACK ELK -
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.
BLACK ELK -
The visions and ceremonies only made me like a whole through which the power could come to the two-leggeds.
BLACK ELK -
If I thought that I was doing it myself, the hole would close up and no power could come through. Then everything I could do would be foolish.
BLACK ELK -
So I took the bright red stick and at the center of the nation’s hoop I thrust it in the earth.
BLACK ELK -
I saw more than I can tell / And I understood more than I saw.
BLACK ELK