Motivational Quotes

Character

You can preach a better sermon with your life than with your lips.

- Goldsmith, Oliver

Best Quotes about Character

What you possess in the world will be found at the day of your death to belong to someone else. But what you are will be yours forever.

Dyke, Henry Van

The four cornerstones of character on which the structure of this nation was built are: initiative, imagination, individuality, and independence.

Rickenbacker, Edward Vernon

Too many lives are needed to make just one.

Montale, Eugenio

Talents are best nurtured in solitude. Character is best formed in the stormy billows of the world.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

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

Those who cross the sea change only the climate, not their character.

Horace

Underneath this flabby exterior is an enormous lack of character.

Oscar Levant

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

Taylor, Bayard

If you stand straight, do not fear a crooked shadow.

Proverb, Chinese

10.

Pity the man who has a character to support --it is worse than a large family -- he is silent poor indeed.

Thoreau, Henry David

11.

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

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

12.

Honor is the inner garment of the Soul; the first thing put on by it with the flesh, and the last it layeth down at its separation from it.

Akhenaton

13.

That which we call character is a reserved force which acts directly by presence, and without means. It is conceived of as a certain undemonstrable force, a familiar or genius, by whose impulses the man is guided, but whose counsels he cannot impart.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

14.

Some people are born hammers, others anvils.

Proverb

15.

Character is like the foundation of a house -- it is below the surface.

16.

Character builds slowly, but it can be torn down with incredible swiftness.

Baldwin, Faith

17.

You can't go around hoping that most people have sterling moral characters. The most you can hope for is that people will pretend that they do.

Lebowitz, Fran

18.

Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

19.

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

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

20.

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.

21.

Character is a victory, not a gift.

22.

It is well for the world that in most of us, by the age of thirty, the character has set like plaster, and will never soften again.

James, William

23.

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

Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

24.

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

Mohammed

25.

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

Shakespeare, William

26.

To keep your character intact you cannot stoop to filthy acts. It makes it easier to stoop the next time.

Hepburn, Katharine

27.

I have conquered an empire but I have not been able to conquer myself.

Peter The Great

28.

If an ass goes traveling it will not come home a horse.

Proverb

29.

The quality of strength lined with tenderness is an unbeatable combination, as are intelligence and necessity when unblunted by formal education.

Angelou, Maya

30.

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

31.

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

32.

Personality can open doors, but only character can keep them open.

Elmer G. Letterman

33.

To be fond of learning is near to wisdom; to practice with vigor is near to benevolence; and to be conscious of shame is near to fortitude. He who knows these three things

Confucius

34.

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

Reagan, Ronald

35.

Without an acquaintance with the rules of propriety, it is impossible for the character to be established.

Confucius

36.

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

37.

We know but a few men, a great many coats and breeches.

Thoreau, Henry David

38.

During my eighty-seven years, I have witnessed a whole succession of technological revolutions. But none of them has done away with the need for character in the individual or the ability to think.

Baruch, Bernard M.

39.

Character is the impulse reined down into steady continuance.

Parkhurst, Charles H.

40.

One stumble is enough to deface the character of an honorable life.

Estrange, L.

41.

Character development is the aim of education.

O'Shea

42.

How difficult it is to save the bark of reputation from the rocks of ignorance.

Petrarch, Francesco

43.

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

44.

Clear conscience never fears midnight knocking.

Proverb, Chinese

45.

If all I'm remembered for is being a good basketball player, then I've done a bad job with the rest of my life.

Thomas, Isiah

46.

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

47.

It is part of the American character to consider nothing as desperate -- to surmount every difficulty by resolution and contrivance.

Jefferson, Thomas

48.

I have often thought the best way to define a man's character would be to seek out the particular mental or moral attitude in which, when it comes upon him, he felt himself most deeply and intensely active and alive. At such moments there is a voice inside which speaks and says: This is the real me!.

James, William

49.

Men of genius are admired, men of wealth are envied, men of power are feared; but only men of character are trusted.

50.

Character is to man what carbon is to steel.

Hill, Napoleon