Motivational Quotes

Character

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

- Seneca

Best Quotes about Character

If a man character is to be abused there's nobody like a relative to do the business.

Thackeray, William M.

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

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

Lois McMaster Bujold

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

Seneca

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

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

Royal, Darrell

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

Guideposts

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

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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

Freeman, Robert

10.

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

Chambers, Oswald

11.

Wealth stays with us a little moment if at all: only our characters are steadfast, not our gold.

Euripides

12.

The empty vessel makes the loudest sound.

Shakespeare, William

13.

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

14.

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

Lippmann, Walter

15.

Surmounting difficulty is the crucible that forms character.

Robbins, Anthony

16.

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.

17.

It takes a great deal of character strength to apologize quickly out of one's heart rather than out of pity. A person must possess himself and have a deep sense of security in fundamental principles and values in order to genuinely apologize.

Covey, Stephen R.

18.

Though intelligence is powerless to modify character, it is a dab hand at finding euphemisms for its weaknesses.

Crisp, Quentin

19.

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

20.

If you create an act, you create a habit. If you create a habit, you create a character. If you create a character, you create a destiny.

Maurois, Andre

21.

Instill the love of you into all the world, for a good character is what is remembered.

Merikare

22.

I would rather be adorned by beauty of character than jewels. Jewels are the gift of fortune, while character comes from within.

Plautus, Titus Maccius

23.

One can acquire everything in solitude - except character.

Marie Henri Beyle

24.

Character is victory organized.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

25.

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

Baldwin, Faith

26.

Strong feelings do not necessarily make a strong character. The strength of a man is to be measured by the power of the feelings he subdues not by the power of those which subdue him.

William Carleton

27.

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

28.

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

Ralph Waldo Emerson

29.

Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

30.

To have character is to be big enough to take life on.

Richards, Mary Caroline

31.

The measure of a man's real character is what he would do if he knew he would never be found out.

Macaulay, Thomas B.

32.

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

33.

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

Bisset, Jacqueline

34.

Character develops itself in the stream of life.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

35.

In attempts to improve your character, know what is in your power and what is beyond it.

Francis Thompson

36.

An excellent man, like precious metal, is in every way invariable; A villain, like the beams of a balance, is always varying, upwards and downwards, himself his own dungeon.

Pandita, Saskya

37.

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

38.

Character, in great and little things, means carrying through what you feel able to do.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

39.

Sometimes people carry to such perfection the mask they have assumed that in due course they actually become the person they seem.

W. Somerset Maugham

40.

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

41.

Before you advise anyone Be yourself! reassess his character.

42.

Success is always temporary. When all is said and one, the only thing you'll have left is your character.

Gill, Vince

43.

We falsely attribute to men a determined character -- putting together all their yesterdays -- and averaging them -- we presume we know them. Pity the man who has character to support -- it is worse than a large family -- he is the silent poor indeed.

Thoreau, Henry David

44.

A good character is the best tombstone. Those who loved you, and were helped by you, will remember you when forget-me-nots are withered. Carve your name on hearts, and not on marble

Spurgeon, Charles Haddon

45.

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

Voltaire

46.

There's a fine line between character building and soul destroying.

Hay, Colin

47.

When about to commit a base deed, respect thyself, though there is no witness.

Ausonius, Decimus Magnus

48.

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

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

49.

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

Jefferson, Thomas

50.

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