The great Chief of Washington sent word that he wants to buy our land; The great Chief also assured us of his friendship and benevolence. This is kind of him, as we know he doesn’t need our friendship. But let’s think about his offer, for we know that if we don’t, the white man will come with arms and take our land. The Great Chief of Washington can trust what Chief Seattle says as surely as our white brothers can trust the changing seasons. My words are like the stars, they don’t pale.
How can you buy or sell the sky, the warmth of the earth? Such an idea is strange to us.
If we don’t own the purity of the air or the radiance of the water, then how can you buy them? Every clod of this land is sacred to my people; every gleaming pine needle, every sandy beach, every veil of mist in the dark forest, every clearing and buzzing insect is sacred in the traditions and conscience of my people. The sap that circulates in the trees carries with it the memories of the red man.
The white man forgets his native land, going to wander, after death, among the stars. Our dead never forget this fair land, for it is the mother of the red man. We are part of the land and Lea is part of us. Fragrant flowers are our sisters; the deer, the horse and the great eagle are our brothers. The rocky ridges, the dew from the meadows, the heat emanating from a mustang’s body, and man, all belong to the same family.
So when the great Chief of Washington sends word that he wants to buy our land, he demands a lot of us. The great Chief sends word that he will reserve for us a place where we can live comfortably. He will be our father and we will be his children. Therefore, we will consider your offer to buy our land. But it was not easy, because this land is sacred to us.
This brilliant water that flows in rivers and streams is not just water, but the blood of our ancestors. If we sell you the land, you will have to remember that it is sacred and you will have to teach your children that it is sacred and that each spectral reflection in the clear water of the lakes counts the winds and the memories of the life of my people. The murmur of the water is the voice of my father’s father. The rivers are our brothers, they quench our thirst. The rivers transport our canoes and feed our children. If we sell you our land, you will have to give the rivers the kindness you would give a brother.
We know that the white man does not understand our way of life. For him, one piece of land is the same as another, because he is an outsider who arrives in the dead of night and takes from the land everything he needs. The land is not his sister, but rather an enemy, and after conquering it, he leaves, leaving behind the tombs of his ancestors, and he doesn’t even care. He snatches the land out of his children’s hands and doesn’t care. Their father’s grave and their children’s right to inheritance are forgotten. He treats his mother, the earth, and his brother, the sky, as things that can be bought, plundered, sold like sheep or glittering beads. His voracity will ruin the land leaving behind only a desert.
I don’t know. Our ways differ from his. The sight of your cities causes torment in the eyes of the red man. But perhaps this is so because the red man is a savage who understands nothing.
There is no quiet place in the white man’s cities. There is no place where you can hear the bloom of spring foliage, or the jingle of an insect’s wings. But perhaps that is because I am a savage who understands nothing; the noise just seems to insult the ears. And what life is that if a man cannot hear the lonely voice of the whippoorwill or the talk of frogs around a marsh? I am a red man and I understand nothing. The Indian prefers the gentle whisper of the wind over the surface of a pond, and the smell of the wind itself, purified by rain or redolent of pine.
Air is precious to the red man, because all creatures breathe in common: animals, trees, man.
The white man seems not to notice the air he breathes. Like a dying man in prolonged agony, he is insensitive to the fetid air. But if we sell you our land, you will have to remember that the air is precious to us, that the air shares your spirit with all the life it sustains. The wind that gave our great-grandfather his first breath of life also receives his last breath. And if we sell you our land, you must keep it preserved, like a sanctuary, as a place where the white man himself can go to taste the wind sweetened with the fragrance of wild flowers.
So, we will consider your offer to buy our land. If we decide to accept it, I will do so on one condition: the white man must treat the animals of this land as if they were his own brothers.
I am a savage and I do not know that it can be otherwise. I’ve seen thousands of bison rotting on the prairies, abandoned by the white man who shoots them down from the moving trains. I’m a savage and I don’t understand how a smoking iron horse can be more important than the bison we Indians kill just for the sustenance of our lives.
What is man without animals? If all the animals died, man would die of a great loneliness of spirit. Because whatever happens to animals will soon happen to men. Everything is related to each other.
You must teach your children that the ground under their feet is the ashes of our ancestors; so that they may respect the country, tell your children that the wealth of the earth is the life of our kindred. Teach your children what we have taught our children: that the earth is our mother. Everything that hurts the earth hurts the children of the earth. If men spit on the ground, they spit on themselves.
One thing we know the earth does not belong to man; it is the man who belongs to the earth. Of that we are sure. All things are intertwined, like the blood that unites a family. Everything is related to each other. Everything when it attacks the earth attacks the children of the earth. It was not man who wove the web of life; he is merely a strand of it. Whatever he does to the plot, he will do to himself.
Our children saw their parents humiliated in defeat. Our warriors succumb under the weight of shame. And after defeat, they spend their time in idleness, poisoning their bodies with sweet foods and fiery drinks. It doesn’t matter where we spend our last days; they are not many. A few more hours, even a few winters, and none of the children of the great tribes that have lived in this land, or that have wandered in small bands through the woods, will be left to weep over the graves; the people that were once as powerful and confident as ours.
Nor can the white man, whose God he walks with and converses with from friend to friend, be exempt from a common fate. We can be brothers after all. Let’s see, one thing we know that the white man will perhaps one day discover: our God is the same God. Perhaps you think, now that you can possess Him as you wish to possess our land; but you can not. He is the God of all mankind and equals his mercy to the red man and the white man. This earth is dear to Him, and to harm the earth is to accumulate contempt for its Creator. Whites will also pass; perhaps earlier than other tribes. You continue to pollute your bed and you will die, one night, suffocated in your own waste!
But, or perish, you will shine brightly, aflame, by the strength of God who brought you to this country, and, by some special design, gave you dominion over the earth and over the red man. This fate is, for us, a mystery, for we cannot imagine what it will be like when all the bison are slaughtered, the wild horses tamed, the secret corners of the forests charged with the scent of many people, and the view of the old hills covered by wires that speak. Where will the tangle of the forest be? It will be over. Where will the eagle be? It will be gone. It remains to say goodbye to the swallow and the hunt; it will be the end of life in fullness and the beginning of the struggle to survive.
Perhaps we would understand if we knew what the white man dreams of; if we only knew what hopes they convey to their children on long winter nights, what visions of the future they offer their minds so that they can form desires for tomorrow. We are, however, savages. The white man’s dreams are hidden from us. And because they are hidden, we have to choose our own path. If we consent to sell our land, it will be to guarantee the reserves you promised us. There, perhaps we can live out our last days as we wish. After the last red man is gone and the memory of him is nothing but the shadow of a cloud hovering above the prairies. The soul of my people will continue to live in forests and beaches, because we love them as a newborn loves the beating of its mother’s heart.
If we sell you our land, love it as we love it. Protect her as we protect her. Never forget what this land was like when you took possession of it. And with all your strength, your might and all your heart, keep it for your children and love it as God loves us all. One thing we know: our God is the same God and this earth is loved by Him. Not even the white man will be able to avoid our common destiny…
Chief Seattle 1787 – 1866