Motivational Quotes

Character

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

- Schopenhauer, Arthur

Best Quotes about Character

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

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

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

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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

Goldsmith, Oliver

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

A man never discloses his own character so clearly as when he describes another s.

Richter, Jean Paul

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

Petrarch, Francesco

Property may be destroyed and money may lose its purchasing power; but, character, health, knowledge and good judgment will always be in demand under all conditions.

Babson, Roger

While he was not as dumb as an ox, he was not any smarter either.

Thurber, James

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

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

10.

Good character is more to be praised than outstanding talent. Most talents are, to some extent, a gift. Good character, by contrast, is not given to us. We have to build it piece by piece-by thought, choice, courage and determination.

Luther, John

11.

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

Disraeli, Benjamin

12.

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

13.

The character of a man is known from his conversations.

Menander

14.

Look, we're all the same; a man is a fourteen-room house --in the bedroom he's asleep with his intelligent wife, in the living-room he's rolling around with some bareass girl, in the library he's paying his taxes, in the yard he's raising tomatoes, and in the cellar he's making a bomb to blow it all up.

Miller, Arthur

15.

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

Elihu Burritt

16.

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

17.

Character in a saint means the disposition of Jesus Christ persistently manifested.

Chambers, Oswald

18.

Football doesn't build character. It eliminates weak ones.

Royal, Darrell

19.

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

Greeley, Horace

20.

The lord will not hold back the promises, even if the person who makes them is not worthy.

21.

Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

22.

Noble character is best appreciated in those ages in which it can most readily develop.

Tacitus, Publius Cornelius

23.

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

24.

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

25.

Clear conscience never fears midnight knocking.

Proverb, Chinese

26.

The happiness of every country depends upon the character of its people, rather than the form of its government.

Haliburton, Thomas C.

27.

It is better for the development of character and contentment to do certain things badly for yourself than to have them done better for you by someone else.

28.

The empty vessel makes the loudest sound.

Shakespeare, William

29.

Underneath this flabby exterior is an enormous lack of character.

Oscar Levant

30.

Character consists of what you do on the third and fourth tries.

Michener, James A.

31.

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

32.

Character is a victory, not a gift.

33.

The hell to be endured hereafter, of which theology tells, is no worse than the hell we make for ourselves in this world by habitually fashioned our characters in the wrong way.

James, William

34.

Integrity has no need of rules.

Camus, Albert

35.

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

Jefferson, Thomas

36.

Character is the indelible mark that determines the only true value of all people and all their work.

Marden, Orison Swett

37.

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

38.

Watch your thoughts; they become words. Watch your words; they become actions. Watch your actions; they become habits. Watch your habits; they become character. Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.

39.

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

Howell, Harry

40.

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

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

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.

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

43.

Character is the result of a system of stereotyped principles.

Hume, David

44.

Few persons are made of such strong fiber that they will make a costly outlay when surface work will pass as well in the market.

Bounds, E. M.

45.

A man's character is his fate.

Heraclitus

46.

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

Angelou, Maya

47.

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

48.

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

49.

Testimony is like an arrow shot from a long bow and the force of it depends on the strength of the arm from which it was shot. Argument is like a bullet fired from a gun and has equal force even when issued from a child.

50.

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

Ralph Waldo Emerson