Top 35 Charles Alexander Eastman Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Each soul must meet the morning sun, the new sweet earth and the Great Silence alone.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

2. “If you ask him: “What is silence?” he will answer, “It is the Great Mystery! The holy silence is His voice!” If you ask: “What are the fruits of silence?” he will say: “They are self-control, true courage or endurance, patience, dignity, and reverence. Silence is the cornerstone of character.””

— Charles Alexander Eastman

3. “Silence is the cornerstone of character.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

4. “In the life of the Indian there is only one inevitable duty-the duty of prayer-the daily recognition of the Unseen and Eternal. Our daily devotions were more necessary to us than daily food.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

5. “We believe profoundly in silence-the sign of a perfect equilibrium. Silence is the absolute poise or balance of body, mind, and spirit.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

6. “The logical man must either deny all miracles or none.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

7. “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

8. “Children must early learn the the beauty of generosity. They are taught to give what they prize most, that they may taste the happiness of giving.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

9. “The clan is nothing more than a larger family, with its patriarchal chief as the natural head, and the union of several clans by intermarriage and voluntary connection constitutes the tribe.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

10. “More than this, even in those white men who professed religion we found much inconsistency of conduct. They spoke much of spiritual things, while seeking only the material.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

11. “Love between a man and a woman is founded on the mating instinct and is not free from desire and self-seeking. But to have a friend and to be true under any and all trials is the mark of a man!”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

12. “The elements and majestic forces in nature, Lightning, Wind, Water, Fire, and Frost, were regarded with awe as spiritual powers, but always secondary and intermediate in character.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

13. “There was no religious ceremony connected with marriage among us, while on the other hand the relation between man and woman was regarded as in itself mysterious and holy.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

14. “One of the things that makes you feel good is to get out into nature – 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, “This place is sacred.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

15. “The religion of the Indian is the last thing about him that the man of another race will ever understand.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

16. “There were no temples or shrines among us save those of nature.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

17. “The native American has been generally despised by his white conquerors for his poverty and simplicity.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

18. “Indian names were either characteristic nicknames given in a playful spirit, deed names, birth names, or such as have a religious and symbolic meaning.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

19. “The logical man must either deny all miracles or none, and our American Indian myths and hero stories are perhaps, in themselves, quite as credible as those of the Hebrews of old.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

20. “As a child I understood how to give; I have forgotten this grace since I became civilized.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

21. “The hospitality of the wigwam is only limited by the institution of war.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

22. “Is there not something worthy of perpetuation in our Indian spirit of democracy, where Earth, our mother, was free to all, and no one sought to impoverish or enslave his neighbor?”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

23. “The red man divided mind into two parts, – the spiritual mind and the physical mind.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

24. “That is, we believed, the supreme duty of the parent, who only was permitted to claim in some degree the priestly office and function, since it is his creative and protecting power which alone approaches the solemn function of Deity.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

25. “The Indian was a religious man from his mother’s womb.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

26. “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

27. “In every religion there is an element of the supernatural, varying with the influence of pure reason over its devotees.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

28. “But to have a friend, and to be true under any and all trials, is the mark of a man!”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

29. “The American Indian was an individualist in religion as in war. He had neither a national army nor an organized church.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

30. “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

31. “If a child is inclined to be grasping, or to cling to any of his or her little possessions, legends are related about the contempt and disgrace falling upon the ungenerous and mean person...”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

32. “The family was not only the social unit, but also the unit of government.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

33. “I have not cared to pile up more dry bones, but to clothe them with flesh and blood.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

34. “He sees no need for setting apart one day in seven as a holy day, since to him all days are God’s.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

35. “No one who is at all acquainted with the Indian in his home can deny that we are a polite people.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

36. “Our people, though capable of strong and durable feeling, were not demonstrative in their affection at any time, least of all in the presence of guests or strangers.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

Featured in: Strong Quotes

37. “It has been said that the position of woman is the test of civilization, and that of our women was secure. In them was vested our standard of morals and the purity of our blood.”

— Charles Alexander Eastman

38. “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