17 Quotes by Luther Standing Bear

Generosity is a mark of bravery, so all Sioux boys were taught to be generous.

Now all these virtues mean one thing, and that is bravery. A Sioux boy was taught to be brave always. It was not sufficient to be brave enough to go to war. He must be brave enough to make personal sacrifices and to think little of personal gain. To be brave was the supreme test of a Sioux boy, and this bravery might receive a greater test in times of peace than in times of war.

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.

The old Lakota was wise. He knew that man’s heart, away from nature, becomes hard; he knew that lack of respect for growing, living things soon led to lack of respect for humans too.

After all the great religions have been preached and expounded, man is still confronted with the Great Mystery.

It is the mothers not the warriors who create a people and guide their destiny.

The man who sat on the ground in his tipi meditating on life and its meaning, accepting the kinship of all creatures and acknowledging unity with the universe of things, was infusing into his being the true essence of civilization.

For the Lakota there was no wilderness. Nature was not dangerous but hospitable, not forbidding but friendly.

Training began with children who were taught to sit still and enjoy it. They were taught to use their organs of smell, to look where there was apparently nothing to see, and to listen intently when all seemingly was quiet. A child who cannot sit still is a half-developed child.