Motivational Quotes

Character

I take it as a man's duty to restrain himself.

- Lois McMaster Bujold

Best Quotes about Character

Wherever man goes to dwell his character goes with him.

Proverb, African

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

Ralph Waldo Emerson

The only way to compel men to speak good of us is to do it.

Voltaire

Good character is not formed in a week or a month. It is created little by little, day by day. Protracted and patient effort is needed to develop good character.

Sivananda, Sri Swami

There is no greater index of character so sure as the voice.

Disraeli, Benjamin

It is not what he had, or even what he does which expresses the worth of a man, but what he is.

Amiel, Henri Frederic

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

Hepburn, Katharine

Few people can distinguish the genuinely good from the reverse.

Juvenal, (Decimus Junius Juvenalis)

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

10.

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

Collins, Marva

11.

One can easily judge the character of a person by the way they treat people who can do nothing for them.

Proverb

12.

Keep in mind that the true measure of an individual is how he treats a person who can do him absolutely no good.

Landers, Ann

13.

I take it as a man's duty to restrain himself.

Lois McMaster Bujold

14.

All men are alike in their lower natures; it is in their higher characters that they differ.

Bovee, Christian Nevell

15.

The depth and strength of a human character are defined by its moral reserves. People reveal themselves completely only when they are thrown out of the customary conditions of their life, for only then do they have to fall back on their reserves.

Trotsky, Leon

16.

Too many lives are needed to make just one.

Montale, Eugenio

17.

Nature magically suits a man to his fortunes, by making them the fruit of his character.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

18.

Too often the strong, silent man is silent only because he does not know what to say, and is reputed strong only because he has remained silent.

Churchill, Winston

19.

Men show their characters in nothing more clearly than in what they think laughable.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

20.

The formation of one's character ought to be everyone's chief aim.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

21.

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

Rickenbacker, Edward Vernon

22.

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

23.

The character of a man is known from his conversations.

Menander

24.

Character isn't something you were born with and can't change, like your fingerprints. It's something you weren't born with and must take responsibility for forming.

Rohn, Jim

25.

Character is our destiny.

Heraclitus

26.

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

27.

Character - the willingness to accept responsibility for one's own life - is the source from which self respect springs.

Joan Didion

28.

It is with trifles and when he is off guard that a man best reveals his character.

Schopenhauer, Arthur

29.

Fame is a vapor, popularity an accident, and riches take wings. Only one thing endures and that is character.

Greeley, Horace

30.

A man's character is the reality of himself; his reputation, the opinion others have formed about him; character resides in him, reputation in other people; that is the substance, this is the shadow.

Beecher, Henry Ward

31.

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

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

32.

Clear conscience never fears midnight knocking.

Proverb, Chinese

33.

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.

34.

As a man thinks in his heart, so is he. [Proverbs 23:7]

Bible

35.

Faced with crisis, the man of character falls back on himself. He imposes his own stamp of action, takes responsibility for it, makes it his own.

Gaulle, Charles De

36.

Underneath this flabby exterior is an enormous lack of character.

Oscar Levant

37.

Put more trust in nobility of character than in an oath.

Solon

38.

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

39.

For character too is a process and an unfolding... among our valued friends is there not someone or other who is a little too self confident and disdainful; whose distinguished mind is a little spotted with commonness; who is a little pinched here and protuberant there with native prejudices; or whose better energies are liable to lapse down the wrong channel under the influence of transient solicitations?

Eliot, George

40.

Strong characters are brought out by change of situation, and gentle ones by permanence.

Richter, Jean Paul

41.

Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

42.

When God measures man, He puts the tape around his heart -- not his head.

Guideposts

43.

Character is the result of a system of stereotyped principles.