Silence is the absolute poise or balance of body, mind, and spirit. Those who can preserve their selfhood ever calm and unshaken by the storms of existence — not a leaf, as it were, a stir on the tree; not a ripple upon the shining pool — those, in the mind of the person of nature, possess the ideal attitude and conduct of life.
— Ohiyesa , The Soul of An Indian by Kent Nerburn, editor