Motivational Quotes

Character

Character is higher than intellect. A great soul will be strong to live as well as think.

- Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Best Quotes about Character

Fame is what you have taken, character is what you give. When to this truth you awaken, then you begin to live.

Taylor, Bayard

People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of their character.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

If anyone tells you someone has changed their character; don't believe it.

Mohammed

You can tell a lot about a fellow's character by his way of eating jelly beans.

Reagan, Ronald

A person reveals his character by nothing so clearly as the joke he resents.

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

The real character of a man is found out by his amusements.

Reynolds, Sir Joshua

You can tell the character of every man when you see how he receives praise.

Seneca

Character contributes to beauty. It fortifies a woman as her youth fades.

Bisset, Jacqueline

Reputation is only a candle, of wavering and uncertain flame, and easily blown out, but it is the light by which the world looks for and finds merit.

Lowell, James Russell

10.

Underneath this flabby exterior is an enormous lack of character.

Oscar Levant

11.

He that has light within his own clear breast may sit in the center, and enjoy bright day: But he that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts benighted walks under the mid-day sun;

Milton, John

12.

If I were to try to read, much less answer, all the attacks made on me, this shop might as well be closed for any other business. I do the very best I know how -- the very best I can. And I mean to keep on doing it to the end. If the end brings me out all right, what is said against me will not amount to anything. If the end brings me out all wrong, ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference.

Lincoln, Abraham

13.

Character is not made in a crisis -- it is only exhibited.

Freeman, Robert

14.

You must look into people, as well as at them.

Chesterfield, Lord

15.

It isn't the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog, that counts.

Howell, Harry

16.

People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of character.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

17.

Character is the impulse reined down into steady continuance.

Parkhurst, Charles H.

18.

Between ourselves and our real natures we interpose that wax figure of idealizations and selections which we call our character.

Lippmann, Walter

19.

Characters do not change. Opinions alter, but characters are only developed.

Disraeli, Benjamin

20.

Some people are born hammers, others anvils.

Proverb

21.

The character of every act depends upon the circumstances in which it is done.

Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

22.

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experiences of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired and success achieved.

Keller, Helen

23.

My father told me that if you saw a man in a Rolls Royce you could be sure he was not a gentleman unless he was the chauffeur.

Arran, Earl of

24.

You are not very good if you are not better than your best friends imagine you to be.

Lavater, Johann Kaspar

25.

Character is made by many acts; it may be lost by a single one.

26.

Let us not say, every man is the architect of his own fortune; but let us say, every man is the architect of his own character.

Boardman, George D.

27.

Character is to man what carbon is to steel.

Hill, Napoleon

28.

Our character...is an omen of our destiny, and the more integrity we have and keep, the simpler and nobler that destiny is likely to be.

George Santayana

29.

Character is always lost when a high ideal is sacrificed on the altar of conformity and popularity.

30.

I appreciate people who are civil, whether they mean it or not. I think: Be civil. Do not cherish your opinion over my feelings. There's a vanity to candor that isn't really worth it. Be kind.

Richard Greenberg

31.

Show me the man you honor, and I will know what kind of a man you are. It shows me what your ideal of manhood is, and what kind of a man you long to be.

Carlyle, Thomas

32.

You can buy a person's time; you can buy their physical presence at a given place; you can even buy a measured number of their skilled muscular motions per hour. But you can not buy enthusiasm... you can not buy loyalty. You can not buy the devotion of hearts, minds, or souls. You must earn these.

Francis, Clarence

33.

The man who cannot believe in himself cannot believe in anything else. The basis of all integrity and character is whatever faith we have in our own integrity.

Smith, Roy L.

34.

Everyone has the obligation to ponder well his own specific traits of character. He must also regulate them adequately and not wonder whether someone else's traits might suit him better. The more definitely his own a man's character is, the better it fits him.

Cicero

35.

Character is what you know you are, not what others think you have.

Collins, Marva

36.

Clear conscience never fears midnight knocking.

Proverb, Chinese

37.

Gross and obscure natures, however decorated, seem impure shambles; but character gives splendor to youth, and awe to wrinkled skin and gray hairs.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

38.

To succeed is nothing -- it's an accident. But to feel no doubts about oneself is something very different: it is character.

Leneru, Marie

39.

Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

40.

Forming characters! Whose? Our own or others? Both. And in that momentous fact lies the peril and responsibility of our existence.

Elihu Burritt

41.

No artist work is so high, so noble, so grand, so enduring, so important for all time, as the making of character in a child.

Cushman, Charlotte Saunders

42.

Weakness of character is the only defect which cannot be amended.

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

43.

Therefore keep in the midst of life. Do not isolate yourself. Be among men and things, and among troubles, and difficulties, and obstacles.

Drummond, Henry

44.

Good character is like a rubber ball -- thrown down hard -- it bounces right back. Good reputation is like a crystal ball -- thrown for gain -- shattered and cracked.

Linall Jr. A. L.

45.

The empty vessel makes the loudest sound.

Shakespeare, William

46.

A rich man has no need of character.

Proverb, Hebrew

47.

A man with a so-called character is often a simple piece of mechanism; he has often only one point of view for the extremely complicated relationships of life.

Strindberg, J. August

48.

Clothes don't tell the character of the man, but they just as well talk for him as against him.

49.

Life every man holds dear; but the dear man holds honor far more precious dear than life.

Shakespeare, William

50.

Nothing marks the character of a young man more than failure.