18 quotes
It requires all to make a bargain for all.
Tecumseh to Governor Harrison (1810)
One of my legs is shot off! But leave me one or two guns loaded — I am going to have a last shot. Be quick and go!
Why not sell the air, the great sea, as well as the earth? Didn't the Great Spirit make them all for the use of his children?
The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Old West (1999)
The way, the only way to stop this evil is for the red man to unite in claiming a common and equal right in the land, as it was first, and should be now, for it was never divided.
Sell a country! Why not sell the air, the clouds and the great sea, as well as the earth? Did not the Great Spirit make them all for the use of his children?
Where today are the Pequot? Where are the Narragansett, the Mohican, the Pokanoket, and many other once powerful tribes of our people?
My heart is a stone: heavy with sadness for my people; cold with the knowledge that no treaty will keep whites out of our lands; hard with the determination to resist as long as I live and breathe.
Touch the Earth: A Self-portrait of Indian Existence (1973)
Let us form one body, one heart, and defend to the last warrior our country, our homes, our liberty, and the graves of our fathers.
Debate at the Choctaw and Chickasaw Council (1811)
Brothers, The white people send runners amongst us; they wish to make us enemies, that they may sweep over and desolate our hunting grounds, like devastating winds, or rushing waters.
Tecumseh to the Osages (1811)
The annihilation of our race is at hand unless we unite in one common cause against the common foe.
Debate at the Choctaw and Chickasaw Council (1811)
Any sale not made by all is not valid.
Tecumseh to Governor Harrison (1810)
The white men aren't friends to the Indians... At first they only asked for land sufficient for a wigwam; now, nothing will satisfy them but the whole of our hunting grounds from the rising to the setting sun.
Brothers — My people wish for peace; the red men all wish for peace; but where the white people are, there is no peace for them, except it be on the bosom of our mother.
Debate at the Choctaw and Chickasaw Council (1811)
Brothers, the white men despise and cheat the Indians; they abuse and insult them; they do not think the red men sufficiently good to live. The red men have borne many and great injuries; they ought to suffer them no longer.
Tecumseh to the Osages (1811)
Brothers, we all belong to one family; we are all children of the Great Spirit; we walk in the same path; slake our thirst at the same spring; and now affairs of the greatest concern lead us to smoke the pipe around the same council fire!
Tecumseh to the Osages (1811)
When the legends die, the dreams end; there is no more greatness.
Disputed as a statement of Tecumseh in Inspire! : What Great Leaders Do (2004)
So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life.
Disputed A Sourcebook for Earth's Community of Religions (1995)
The Muscogee was once a mighty people. The Georgians trembled at your war-whoop, and the maidens of my tribe, on the distant lakes, sung the prowess of your warriors and sighed for their embraces. Now your very blood is white; your tomahawks have no edge; your bows and arrows were buried with your fathers. Oh! Muscogees, brethren of my mother, brush from your eyelids the sleep of slavery; once more strike for vengeance; once more for your country. The spirits of the mighty dead complain. Their tears drop from the weeping skies. Let the white race perish! They seize your land, they corrupt your women, they trample on your dead! Back! whence they came, upon a trail of blood, they must be driven! Back! back — ay, into the great water whose accursed waves brought them to our shores! Burn their dwellings! Destroy their stock! Slay their wives and children! The red man owns the country, and the pale-face must never enjoy it! War now! War forever! War upon the living! War upon the dead! Dig their very corpses from the graves! Our country must give no rest to the white man's bones.
Misattributed Let the White Race Perish (1811)