Quotations

"Hills are always more beautiful than stone buildings, you know. Living in a city is an artificial existance. Lots of people hardly ever feel real soil under their feet, see plants grow except in flower pots, or get far enough beyond the street light to catch the enchantment of a night sky studded with stars. When people live far from scenes of the Great Spirit's making, it's easy for them to forget his laws."

--Tatanga Mani (Walking Buffalo), Stoney, 1958.

"There is no inner life without outer experience. The tragedy in the elimination of the primordial forests is not the economic but the soul-loss that is involved. For we are depriving our imagination, our emotions, and even our intellect of that overwhelming experience communicated by the wilderness. For children to live simply in contact with concrete and steel and wires and wheels and machines, for them to never experience any primordial reality or even to see the stars at night; this is a soul deprivation that diminishes the deepest of our human experiences."

-- Thomas Berry

"Human beings are given mind not muscle. So, I say the most important of all the truths that we are being confronted with is that we are here for our mind functioning. Why are we included in an eternally regenerative design in a universe with no waste? We are apparently here as local information gatherers. Being given the capacity to understand principles so we can develop instruments to go into great macrocosms and microcosms, to deal in a universe which is 99 percent nonsensorily contactable, we are able then to deal with what is common to all lives in all history: problems, problems, problems. We are here for problem solving, not to get over into some universe with no problem of any kind. No, the better you are at problem solving, the worse problems you're going to get. We are here for that. That is our function.

"Humanity is now in a very critical and what I feel is a final examination. When nature has a very important function like humans, this human mind of local information gathering and problem solving, she doesn't leave it all in this one investment, she makes many alternate starts. This morning when I came in from outside, I picked up this little seed from a maple tree. Now, a tree's function is to impound the sun's radiation, to convert it by photosynthesis, and to bring energy and its circulation into the whole ecology, because you and I can't take the sun's energy through our skins. But with this seed the tree is able to get new little trees out from under its shadow so they can get the sun. So she makes these beautiful flying machines. And I say she has so many alternate plantings in our universe besides human beings. So we're into a kind of final examination right now, now that it has become clear. The information is here. We do have the capability to make it. It does not have to be you or me ever again.

"We're really going back to the first two laws we were ever taught today: Love thy God, this is the truth. And love thy neighbor as thyself. Finally you can afford to love they neighbor as thyself. It does not have to be you or me ever again.

"I would like personally to end this way. I've witnessed one miracle after another through my whole life, extraordinary things happening. I see that God tries very hard and apparently is intent to make us a success if it is possible. So if we don't make it, it is because of each individual. You can't leave it to your politicians to represent you; you can't leave it to your ministers to pray for you. It's going to be how each individual reacts in relation to the truth."

-- Buckminster Fuller, 1978

..."But I sense that things are beginning to change. Your appearance here in this room is a sign of change--and as you recall, I nearly missed it myself. I sense that more and more of you are becoming alarmed about your headlong plunge towards catastrophe. I sense that more and more of you are casting about for new ideas."

"Yeah. But unfortunately more and more of us are also casting about for more and more exotic forms of hoogy-moogy."

"That's only to be expected, Julie. What you're experiencing is tantamount to cultural collapse. For ten thousand years you've believed that you have the one right way for people to live. But for the last three decades or so, that belief has become more and more untenable with every passing year. You may think it odd that this is so, but it's the men of your culture who are being hit the hardest by the failure of your cultural mythology. They have (and have always had) a much greater investment in the righteousness of your revolution. In coming years, you'll see them withdraw ever more completely into the surrogate world of male success, the world of sports. And, much worse, you'll see them taking ever more violent revenge for their disappointment on the world around them--and particularly on the women around them."

"Why on women?"

"The Taker dream has alway been a man's dream, Julie, and the men of your culture imagine that the collapse of this dream will devastate them while leaving women relatively untouched."

"And won't it?"

Ishmael thought for a moment before answering. "The inmates of the Taker prison build the prison anew for themselves in every generation, Julie. Your mother and father did their part and are doing it still. You personally, as you dutifully go to school and prepare to take your place in the world of work, are even now engaged in building the prison for your own generation to occupy. When it's all done, it'll be the work of all of you, men and women alike. Even so, the women of your culture have never been as enthusiastic about prison life as the men--have rarely gotten as much out of it as men have."

"Are you saying that men run the prison?"

"No. As long as the food remains under lock and key, the prison runs itself. The governing that you see is the prisoners governing themselves. They're allowed to do that and to live as they please within the prison. For the most part, the prisoners have chosen to be governed by men--but these men don't run the prison itself."

"What's the prison then?"

"The prison is your culture, which you sustain generation after generation. You yourself are learning from your parents how to be a prisoner. Your parents learned from their parents how to be a prisoner. And so on, back to the beginning in the Fertile Crescent ten thousand years ago."

"How do we stop that?"

"By learning something different, Julie. By refusing to teach your children how to be prisoners. By breaking the pattern. This is why, when people ask me what they should do, I tell them, 'Teach others what you've learned here.' All too often, however, they reply by saying, 'Yes, that's fine, but what should we do?' When six billion of you refuse to teach your children how to be prisoners of Taker culture, this awful dream of yours will be over--in a single generation. It can only continue for as long as you perpetuate it. Your culture has no independent existence--no existence outside of you--and if you cease to perpetuate it, then it will vanish. Must vanish, like a flame with nothing to feed on."

"Yeah, but what would happen then? You can't just stop teaching your children anything, can you?"

"Of course not, Julie. You can't just stop teaching them anything. Rather, you must teach them something new. And if you're going to teach them something new, then of course you must first learn something new yourself. And that's what you're here to do."

-- Daniel Quinn, "My Ishmael", 123-125.

All men and women are born, live suffer and die; what distinguishes us one from another is our dreams, whether they be dreams about worldly or unworldly things, and what we do to make them come about... We do not choose to be born. We do not choose our parents. We do not choose our historical epoch, the country of our birth, or the immediate circumstances of our upbringing. We do not, most of us, choose to die; nor do we choose the time and conditions of our death. But within this realm of choicelessness, we do choose how we live. 

-- Joseph Epstein

"Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end...liberty is the only object which benefits all alike, and provokes no sincere opposition...The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern...Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

-- Lord Acton (1834-1902)

"...Socrates, who lived a very frugal and simple life, loved to go to the market. When his students asked about this, he replied, 'I love to go and see all the things I am happy without.'"

-- After the Ecstasy, the Laundry, by Jack Kornfield

"The people of your culture cling with fanatical tenacity to the specialness of man. They want desperately to perceive a vast gulf between man and the rest of creation. This mythology of human superiority justifies their doing whatever they please with the world, just the way Hitler's mythology of Aryan superiority justified his doing whatever he pleased with Europe. But in the end this mythology is not deeply satisfying. The Takers are a profoundly lonely people. The world for them is enemy territory, and they live in it like an army of occupation, alienated and isolated by their extraordinary specialness.

"That's true. But what are you getting at?"

Instead of answering my question, Ishmael said, "Among the Leavers, crime, mental illness, suicide, and drug addiction are great rarities. How does Mother Culture account for this?"

"I'd say it's because . . . Mother Culture says it's because the Leavers are just too primitive to have these sorts of things."

"In other words, crime, mental illness, suicide, and drug addiction are features of an advanced culture."

"That's right. Nobody says it that way, of course, but that's how it's understood. These things are the price of advancement."

"There's an almost opposite opinion that had wide currency in your culture for a century or so. An opposite opinion as to why these things are rare among Leavers."

I thought for a minute. "You mean the Noble Savage theory. I can't say I know it in detail."

"But you have an impression of it. That's what's current in your culture--not the theory in detail but an impression of it."

"True. It's the idea that people living close to nature tend to be noble. It's seeing all those sunsets that does it. You can't watch a sunset and then go off and set fire to your neighbor's tepee. Living close to nature is wonderful for your mental health."

"You understand that I'm not saying anything like this."

"Yes. But what are you saying?"

"We've had a look at the story the Takers have been enacting here for the past ten thousand years. The Leavers too are enacting a story. Not a story told but a story enacted."

"What do you mean by that?"

"If you go among the various people peoples of your culture--if you go to China and Japan and Russia and England and India--each people will give you a completely different account of themselves, but they are nonetheless all enacting a single basic story, which is the story of the Takers. The same is true of the Leavers. The Bushmen of Africa, the Alawa of Australia, the Kreen-Akrore of Brazil, and the Navajo of the United States would each give you a different account of themselves, but they too are all enacting one basic story, which is the story of the Leavers."

"I see what you are getting at. It isn't the tale you tell that counts, it's the way you actually live."

"That's correct. The story the Takers have been enacting here for the past ten thousand years is not only disastrous for mankind and for the world, it's fundamentally unhealthy and unstatisfying. It's a megalomaniac's fantasy, and enacting it has given the Takers a culture riddled with greed, cruelty, mental illness, crime, and drug addiction."

"Yes, that seems to be so."

"The story the Leavers have been enacting here for the past three million years isn't a story of conquest and rule. Enacting it doesn't give them power. Enacting it gives them lives that are satisfying and meaningful to them. This is what you'll find if you go among them. They're not seething with discontent and rebellion, not incessantly wrangling over what should be allowed and what forbidden, not forever accusing each other of not living the right way, not living in terror of each other, not going crazy because their lives seem empty and pointless, not having to stupefy themselves with drugs to get through the days, not inventing a new religion every week to give them something to hold on to, not forever searching for something to do or something to believe in that will make their lives worth living. And--I repeat--this is not because they live close to nature or have no formal government or because they're innately noble. This is simply because they're enacting a story that works well for people--a story that worked well for three million years and that still works well where the Takers haven't managed to stamp it out."

-- Daniel Quinn (Ishmael 146 - 148)

The Earth was created by the assistance of the sun, and it should be left as it was.... The country was made without lines of demarcation, and it is no man's business to divide it.... I see the whites all over the country gaining wealth, and see their desire to give us lands which are worthless.... The earth and myself are of one mind. The measure of the land and the measure of our bodies are the same. Say to us if you can say it, that you were sent by the Creative Power to talk to us. Perhaps you think the Creator sent you here to dispose of us as you see fit. If I thought you were sent by the Creator I might be induced to think you had a right to dispose of me. Do not misunderstand me, but understand fully with reference to my affection for the land. I never said the land was mine to do with as I choose. The one who has a right to dispose of it is the one who has created it. I claim a right to live on my land, and accord you the privilege to return to yours.

- Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce

"The great moral failure of our time has been the willingness of men and women to become passive members of anonymous masses in mindless conformity. With scarcely a moment's reflection, men and women have handed their freedom of mind and spirit over to ruthless governments and leaders."

-- Sam Keen

"Whoever gives his labor for money sells himself and puts himself in the rank of slaves."

-- Cicero

We were lawless people, but we were on pretty good terms with the Great Spirit, creator and ruler of all. You whites assumed we were savages. You didn't understand our prayers. You didn't try to understand. When we sang our praises to the sun or moon or wind, you said we were worshipping idols. Without understanding, you condemned us as lost souls just because our form of worship was different from yours.

We saw the Great Spirit's work in almost everything; sun, moon, trees, wind, and mountains. Sometimes we approached him through these things. Was that so bad? I think we have a true belief in the supreme being, a stronger faith than that of most whites who have called us pagans.... Indians living close to nature and nature's ruler are not living in darkness.

Did you know that trees talk? Well they do. They talk to each other, and they'll talk to you if you listen. Trouble is, white people don't listen. They never learned to listen to the Indians so I don't suppose they'll listen to other voices in nature. But I have learned a lot from trees: sometimes about the weather, sometimes about animals, sometimes about the Great Spirit.

-- Tatanga Mani (Walking Buffalo), Stoney

"What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the winter time. It is the shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the Sunset."

-- Crowfoot, 1890.

I know you're out there. I can feel you now. I know that you're afraid... afraid of us. You're afraid of change. I don't know the future. I didn't come here to tell you how this is going to end. I came here to tell how it's going to begin. I'm going to hang up this phone, and then show these people what you don't want them to see. I'm going to show them a world without you. A world without rules or controls, borders or boundaries. A world where anything is possible. Where we go from there is a choice I leave to you.

-- Neo, The Matrix

I'd like to share a revelation that I've had, during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species. I realized that you're not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment, but you humans do not. You move to an area, and you multiply, and multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet, you are a plague, and we are the cure.

-- Agent, The Matrix

What you know you can't explain, but you feel it. You've felt it your entire life, that there's something wrong with the world. You don't know what it is, but it's there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad.

-- Morpheus, The Matrix

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money from the public treasure. From that moment on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most money from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's great civilizations has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through the following sequence: from bondage to spiritual faith, from spiritual faith to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency, from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependency, from dependency back to bondage."

-- Alexander Tyler

Editorial note by T.C. McLuhan: Adario, a seventeenth-century Huron chief, was also known as Kondiaronk (his Huron name) and The Rat (so called by the French). He had a high reputation for bravery and sagacity, and played a prominent part in Frontenac's War (1689-1697) -- a series of conflicts between the French and English, and between the French along with their Indian allies and the Iroquois. His skill in diplomacy and confederating the tribes made him an acclaimed peacemaker. He died in Montreal during an important peace conference in 1701. Adario travelled widely and said of his travels: "I have been in France, New York and Quebec, where I Study'd the Customs and Doctrines of the English and French." The following discourse took place between Adario and Baron de Lahontan, a Frenchman, explorer and Lord Lieutenant of the French colony at Placentia in Newfoundland. Lahontan has just explained to Adario that without punishing the wicked and rewarding the good, murder and robbery would spread everywhere, and the white man would soon be the most miserable people upon the earth. Adario, in turn, interprets his understanding of the white man's law.

NAY, YOU ARE MISERABLE ENOUGH ALREADY, AND INDEED I CAN'T see how you can be more such. What sort of Men must the EUROPEANS be? What Species of Creatures do they retain to? The EUROPEANS, who must be forc'd to do Good, and have no other Prompter for the avoiding of Evil than the fear of Punishment. If I ask'd thee, what a Man is, thou wouldst answer me, He's a FRENCHMAN, and yet I'll prove that your MAN is rather a BEAVER. For MAN is not intitled to that character upon the force of his walking upright upon two Legs, or of Reading and Writing, and showing a Thousand other Instances of his Industry....

Who gave you all the Countries that you now inhabit, by what Right do you possess them? They always belonged to the ALGONKINS before. In earnest, my dear Brother, I'm sorry for thee from the bottom of my soul. Take my advice, and turn HURON; for I see plainly a vast difference between thy condition and mine. I am Master of my Condition and mine. I am Master of my own Body, I have the absolute disposal of my self, I do what I please, I am the first and the last of my Nation, I fear no Man, and I depend only upon the Great Spirit. Whereas, thy Body, as well as thy Soul, are doomed to a dependence upon thy great Captain, thy Vice-Roy disposes of thee, thou hast not the liberty of doing what thou hast a mind to; thou art afraid of Robbers, false Witnesses, Assassins, etc., and thou dependest upon an infinity of Persons whose Places have raised them above thee. Is it true or not?

-- Adario, Huron.

"Pulling together is the aim of despotism and tyranny. Free men pull in all kinds of directions."

-- Terry Pratchett, The Truth.

"When you defeat a thousand opponents, you still have a thousand opponents. When you change a thousand minds, you have a thousand allies."

-- Daniel Quinn

"When we consider the matter, we start to see that we cannot finally seperate out any phenomena from the context of other phenomena. We can only really speak in terms of relationships. In the course of our daily lives, we engage in countless different activities and recieve huge sensory input from all that we encounter. The problem of misperception, which, of course, varies in degree, usually arises because of our tendency to isolate particular aspects of an event or experience and see them as constituting its totality. This leads to a narrowing of perspective and from there to false expectations. But when we consider reality itself we quickly become aware of its infinite complexity, and we realize that our habitual perception of it is often inadequate. If this were not so, the concept of deception would be meaningless. If things and events always unfolded as we expected, we would have no notion of illusion or misconception."

-- H.H. The Dalai Lama

"Whatever your practice, the important point is this life that you are living and how to take care of it. Under certain conditions and involvements, a good thing is good, a poor thing is poor, and inadequate thing is inadequate. When you truly appreciate that all the dharmas are Buddha dharma and all dharmas are without self, your life will unfold naturally and you will know what to do."

-- Taizan Maezumu Roshi

"A human being is part of the whole called by us universe , a part limited in time and space. We experience ourselves, our thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest. A kind of optical delusion of consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from the prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty... We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive."

-- Albert Einstein

"The earth is our mother. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons and daughters of the earth. This we know. All things are connected like the blood which unites one family...We did not weave the web of life, we are merely a strand in it. Whatever we do to the web we do to ourselves."

-- Chief Seattle, upon the surrender of his land

All living creatures and all plants derive their life from the sun. If it were not for the sun, there would be darkness and nothing could grow -- the earth would be without life. Yet the sun must have the help of the earth. If the sun alone were to act on animals and plants, the heat would be so great that they would die, but there are clouds that bring rain, and the action of the sun and the earth together supply the moisture that is needed for life. The roots of a plant grow down, and the deeper they go, the more moisture they find. This is according to the laws of nature and is one of the evidence of the wisdom of Wakan Tanka. Plants are sent by Wakan Tanka and come from the ground at his command, the part to be affected by the sun and the rain appearing above the ground and the roots pressing downward to find the moisture which is supplied for them. Animals and plants are taught by Wakan Tanka what they are to do. Wakan Tanka teaches the birds to make nests, yet the nests of all birds are not alike. Wakan tanka gives them merely the outline. Some make better nests than others. In the same way, some animals are satisfied with very rough dwellings, while others make attractive places to live. Some animals also take better care of their young than others. The forest is the home of many birds and other animals, and the water is the home of fish and reptiles. All birds, even those of the same species, are not alike, and it is the same with animals and with human beings. The reason Wakan Tanka does not make two birds, or animals, or human beings exactly alike are because each is placed here by Wakan Tanka to be an independent individuality and to rely on itself. Some animals are made to live on the ground. The stones and the minerals are placed in the ground by Wakan Tanka, some stones being more exposed than others. When a medicine man says he talks with the sacred stones, it is because of all the substances in the ground, these are the ones, which most often appear in dreams and are able to communicate with men.

From my boyhood I have observed leaves, trees, and grass, and I never found two alike. They may have a general likeness, but on examination I have found that they differ slightly. Plants are of different families.... It is the same with animals.... It is the same with human beings; there is some place, which is best, adapted to each. The seeds of the plants are blown about by the wind until they reach the place where they will grow best -- where the action of the sun and the presence of moisture are most favorable to them, and there they take root and grow. All living creatures and all plants are a benefit to something. Certain animals fulfill their purpose by definite acts. The crows, buzzards and flies are somewhat similar in their use, and even the snakes have purpose in being. In the early days the animals probably roamed over a very wide country until they found a proper place. An animal depends a great deal on the natural conditions surrounding it. If the buffalo were here today, I think they would be different from the buffalo of the old days because all the natural conditions have changed. They would not find the same food, nor the same surroundings. We see the change in our ponies. In the old days they could stand great hardship and travel long distance without water. They lived on certain kinds of food and drank pure water. Now our horses require a mixture of food; they have less endurance and must have constant care. It is the same with the Indians; they have less freedom and they fall an easy prey to disease. In the old days they were rugged and healthy, drinking pure water and eating the meat of the buffalo, which had a wide range, not being shut up like cattle of the present day. The water of the Missouri River is not pure, as it used to be, and many of the creeks are no longer good for us to drink.

A man ought to desire that which is genuine instead of that which is artificial. Long ago there was no such thing as a mixture of earths to make paint. There were only three colors of native earth paint -- red, white, and black. These could be obtained only in certain places. When other colors were desired, the Indians mixed the juices of plants, but it was found that these mixed colors faded and it could always be told when the red was genuine -- the red made of burned clay.

-- Okute (Shooter), Teton Sioux, 1911.

"Conversation was never begun at once, nor in a hurried manner. No one was quick with a question, no matter how important, and no one was pressed for an answer. A pause giving time for thought was the truly courteous way of beginning and conducting a conversation. Silence was meaningful with the Lakota, and his granting a space of silence to the speech-maker and his own moment of silence before talking was done in the practice of true politeness and regard for the rule that, 'thought comes before speech.'"

- Luther Standing Bear

"The commonest technique of control in modern life is punishment. The pattern is familiar: if a man does not behave as you wish, knock him down; if a child misbehaves, spank him; if the people of a country misbehave, bomb them. Legal and police systems are based upon such punishments as fines, flogging, incarceration, and hard labour."

-- B.F. Skinner, 1953, Punishment: A Questionable Technique.

...I watch and I wonder and I think. I think of the old slavery, and of the way The Economy has now improved upon it. The new slavery has improved upon the old by giving the new slaves the illusion that they are free. The Economy does not take people's freedom by force, which would be against its principles, for it is very humane. It buys their their freedom, pays for it, and then persuades its money back again with shoddy goods and the promise of freedom. "Buy a car," it says, "and be free. Buy a boat and be free. Buy a beer and be free." Is this not the raw material of bad dreams? Or is it maybe the very nightmare itself?

-- Wendell Barry, Jayber Crow.

The White people never cared for the land or deer or bear. When we Indians kill meat, we eat it all up. When we dig roots we make little holes. When we built houses, we make little holes. When we burn grass for grasshoppers, we don't ruin things. We shake down acorns and pinenuts. We don't chop down the trees We use only dead wood. But the White people plow up the ground, pull down the trees, kill everything. The tree says, "Don't. I am sore. Don't hurt me." But they chop it and cut it up. The spirit of the land hates them. They blast out trees and stir it up to its depths. They saw up the trees. That hurts them. The Indians never hurt anything, but the White people destroy all. They blast rocks and scatter them on the ground. The rock says, "Don't. You are hurting me." But the White people pay no attention. When the Indians use rocks, they take little round ones for their cooking....How can the spirit of the earth like the White man?....Everywhere the White man has touched it, it is sore.

-- holy Wintu woman

The western historian Robert M. Utley quotes a Georgia governor, who stated the creed of many whites in regard to treaties: "Treaties were expedients by which ignorant, intractable, and savage people were induced without bloodshed to yield up what civilized people had the right to possess by virtue of that command of the Creator delivered to man upon his formation--be fruitful, multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it."

-- Utley, Indian Frontier of the American west, 30.

Inability to accept the mystic experience is more than an intellectual handicap. Lack of awareness of the basic unity of organism and environment is a serious and dangerous hallucination. For in a civilization equipped with immense technological power, the sense of alienation between man and nature leads to the use of technology in a hostile spirit---to the "conquest" of nature instead of intelligent co-operation with nature.

-- Alan Watts, Psychedelics and Religious Experience

"The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do."

--Samuel P. Hunting

"To be nobody but yourself -- in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else -- means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight, and never stop fighting."

-- e.e. cummings

"Freedom means being in control (either as an individual or as a member of a SMALL group) of the life-and-death issues of one's existence; food, clothing, shelter and defense against whatever threats there may be in one's environment. Freedom means having power; not the power to control other people but the power to control the circumstances of one's own life. One does not have freedom if anyone else (especially a large organization) has power over one, no matter how benevolently, tolerantly and permissively that power may be exercised."

-- Theodore Kaczynski

"The being within, communing with past ages, tells me that once, nor until lately, there was no Whiteman on this continent, that it then all belonged to the Great Spirit that made them to keep it, to traverse it, to enjoy its productions, and to fill it with the same race, once a happy race; since made miserable by the White people, who are never contented but always encroaching.

The way, and the only way, to check and to stop this evil, is for all the Redmen to unite in claiming a common and equal right in the land, as it was at first and should be yet; for it was never divided, but belongs to all for the use of each. That no part has a right to sell, even to each other, much less to strangers -- those who want all and will not do with less. The White people have no right to take the land from the Indians, because they had it first, it is theirs.... There cannot be two occupations in the same place. The first excludes all others. It is not so in hunting or travelling, for there the same ground will serve many ... but the camp is stationary.... It belongs to the first who sits down on his blanket or skins, which he has thrown upon the ground, and till he leaves it, no other has a right."

-- Tecumseh (Shooting Star), Shawnee, 1810.

"If parents love their children, they will not be nationalistic, they will not identify themselves with any country; for the worship of the State brings on war, which kills or maims their sons. If parents love their children, they will discover what is right relationship to property; for the possessive instinct has given property an enormous and false significance which is destroying the world. If parents love their children, they will not belong to any organized religion; for dogma and belief divide people into conflicting groups, creating antagonism between man and man. If parents love their children, they will do away with envy and strife, and will set about altering fundamentally the structure of present-day society.

As long as we want our children to be powerful, to have bigger and better positions, to become more and more successful, there is no love in our hearts; for the worship of success encourages conflict and misery. To love one's children is to be in complete communion with them; it is to see that they have the kind of education that will help them to be sensitive, intelligent and integrated."

-- Jiddu Krishnamurti

"The natural world is subject as well as object. The natural world is the material source of our being as earthlings and life-giving nourishment of our physical, emotional, aesthetic, moral and religious existence. The natural world is the larger sacred community to which we belong. To be alienated from this community is to become destitute in all that makes us human. To damage this community is to diminish our own existence."

-- Thomas Berry, The Dream of the Earth

"He who recognizes the system, of he the system is not worthy."

-- Jesus

"A man asks for help for that which he can not do alone, not for that in which he desires companionship."

-- Daniel Fourwinds

"The only thing that I know for certain, is that I know nothing."

-- Socrates

"Let him who seeks continue seeking until he finds. When he finds, he will become troubled. When he becomes troubled, he will be astonished, and he will rule over the All."

-- Jesus

"Grapes are not harvested from thorns, nor are figs gathered from thistles, for they do not produce fruit. A good man brings forth good from his storehouse; an evil man brings forth evil things from his evil storehouse, which is in his heart, and says evil things. For out of the abundance of the heart he brings forth evil things."

-- Jesus

"Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose."

-- Sheldon B. Kopp

"Freedom is achieved only when man cares no longer about the impression he is making or about to make."

-- Bruce Lee

The only meaning in life is that which we bring to it.

"If you talk about things you have not experienced, you are wasting your and other people's time. As you continue the practice of looking deeply, you will see this more and more clearly, and you will save a lot of paper and publishing enterprises and have more time to enjoy your tea and live your daily life in mindfulness."

-- Thich Nhat Hanh

"But I am afraid that many Christians and many Buddhists do not practice, or if they do, they practice only when they find themselves in difficult situations, and after that, they forget. Or their practice may be superficial. They support churches and temples, organize ceremonies, convert people, do charity work or social work, or take up an apostolic ministry, but they do not practice mindfulness or pray while they act. They may devote an hour each day for chanting or liturgy, but after a while, the practice becomes dry and automatic and they do not know how to refresh it. They may believe that they are serving the Buddha, the Dharma, the Sangha, or serving the Trinity and the church, but their practice does not touch the living Buddha or the living Christ. At the same time, these men and women do not hesitate to align themselves with those in power in order to strengthen the position of their church or community. They build up a self instead of letting go of the ideas of self. Then they look at this self as absolute truth and dismiss all other spiritual traditions as false. This is a very dangerous attitude; it always leads to conflicts and war. Its nature is intolerance."

-- Thich Nhat Hanh

"You can always see the choices you are making by looking at your movie. If your life has a lot of angry people in it, you are choosing to be angry. If it has a lot of loving people in it, you are choosing to be loving. This is the way it is for everyone. Each person has his or her own movie, and each person decides what to put in it."

-- Gary Zukav

"Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job."

-- Douglas Adams

"It is the theory which decides what we can observe."

-- Albert Einstien

main page. ted's stuff. beneficial teachings. news & info. essays & discussions. resources.

Please support my work. To find out more click here.