It is good to have a reminder of death before us, for it helps us to understand the impermanence of life on this earth, and this understanding may aid us in preparing for our own death.
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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And I saw that the sacred hoop of my people as one of many hoops that made one circle.
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As you walk upon the sacred earth, treat each step as a prayer.
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We should understand that the Great Spirit is also above all these things and peoples.
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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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Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were.
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The visions and ceremonies only made me like a whole through which the power could come to the two-leggeds.
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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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Any man who is attached to things of this world is one who lives in ignorance and is being consumed by the snakes of his own passions
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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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So I took the bright red stick and at the center of the nation’s hoop I thrust it in the earth.
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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.
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But if the Vision was true and mighty, as I know, it is true and mighty yet;for such things are of Spirit, and it is in the darkness of their eyes that men get lost.
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I saw more than I can tell / And I understood more than I saw.
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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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And as he spoke of understanding, I looked up and saw the rainbow leap with flames of many colors over me.
BLACK ELK