Chief Seattle Quotes

Take nothing but memories, leave nothing but footprints!

Like a man who has been dying for many days, a man in your city is numb to the stench.

About Author

Seattle (c. 1780~86 – June 7, 1866; Lushootseed: siʔaɬ, IPA: [ˈsiʔaːɬ]; usually styled as Chief Seattle) was a leader of the Duwamish and Suquamish peoples. A leading figure among his people, he pursued a path of accommodation to white settlers, forming a personal relationship with Doc Maynard. The city of Seattle, in the U.S. state of Washington, was named after him. A widely publicized speech arguing in favor of ecological responsibility and respect for Native Americans' land rights had been attributed to him.

What is man without the beasts? For if all the beast were gone, man would die of a great loneliness of the spirit.

Revenge by young men is considered gain, even at the cost of their own lives, but old men who stay at home in times of war, and mothers who have sons to lose, know better.

Day and night cannot dwell together. The Red Man has ever fled the approach of the White Man, as the morning mist flees before the morning sun.

Youth is impulsive. When our young men grow angry at some real or imaginary wrong, and disfigure their faces with black paint, it denotes that their hearts are black, and that they are often cruel and...

When the last red man shall have perished from the earth and his memory among the white men shall have become a myth, these shores will swarm with the invisible dead of my tribe. The white man will ne...