I looked below and saw my people there, and all were well and happy except one, and he was lying like the dead – and that one was myself.
BLACK ELKThe song and the drumming were like this: Behold, a sacred voice is calling you; All over the sky a sacred voice is calling.
More Black Elk Quotes
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It’s in the darkness of men’s eyes that they get lost.
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I cured with the power that came through me.
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And when I breathed, my breath was lightning.
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A good nation I will make live.This the nation above has said.They have given me the power to make over.
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Once we were happy in our own country and we were seldom hungry, for then the two-leggeds and the four-leggeds lived together like relatives, and there was plenty for them and for us.
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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.
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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.
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I had a vision with which I might have saved my people, but I had not the strength to do it.
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But I think I have done right to save the vision in this way, even though I may die sooner because I did it; for I know the meaning of the vision is wise and beautiful and good; and you can see that I am only a pitiful old man after all.
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The hawk swoops down on its prey, so does the Indian. In his lament he is like an animal.
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I think I have told you, but if I have not, you must have understood, that a man who has a vision is not able to use the power of it until after he has performed the vision on earth for the people to see.
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You remember that my great vision came to me when I was only nine years old, and you have seen that I was not much good for anything until after I had performed the horse dance near the mouth of the Tongue River during my eighteenth summer.
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The power of a thing or an act is in the meaning and the understanding.
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Grandfather, Great Spirit, once more behold me on earth and lean to hear my feeble voice.
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I was four years old then, and I think it must have been the next summer that I first heard the voices.
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It is hard to follow one great vision in this world of darkness and of many changing shadows. Among those men get lost.
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And I saw that the sacred hoop of my people was one of many hoops that made one circle, wide as daylight and as starlight, and in the center grew one mighty flowering tree to shelter all children of one mother and one father. And I saw that it was holy.
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The Great Spirit is everywhere; He hears whatever is in our minds and our hearts, and it is not necessary to speak to Him in a loud voice.
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The life of a person is a circle from childhood to childhood, and so it is in everything where power moves.
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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.
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It is in the darkness of their eyes that men lose their way.
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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.
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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.
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And as he spoke of understanding, I looked up and saw the rainbow leap with flames of many colors over me.
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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.
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So I took the bright red stick and at the center of the nation’s hoop I thrust it in the earth.
BLACK ELK