Motivational Quotes

Character

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

- Disraeli, Benjamin

Best Quotes about Character

We don't love qualities, we love persons; sometimes by reason of their defects as well as of their qualities.

Maritain, Jacques

Character is the sum and total of a person's choices.

Fitzwater, P. B.

Character is the impulse reined down into steady continuance.

Parkhurst, Charles H.

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

Estrange, L.

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

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

Howell, Harry

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.

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

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

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

10.

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

Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

11.

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

12.

Character, not circumstances, makes the man.

Washington, Booker T.

13.

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

Guideposts

14.

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

Confucius

15.

People with courage and character always seem sinister to the rest.

Hermann Hesse

16.

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

Thurber, James

17.

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

18.

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

Horace

19.

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

Chesterfield, Lord

20.

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

Francis Thompson

21.

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

Seneca

22.

Everyone has three characters, that which they exhibit, that which they have, and that which they think they have.

Karr, Alphonse

23.

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

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

24.

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

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

25.

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

Ausonius, Decimus Magnus

26.

Some people are born hammers, others anvils.

Proverb

27.

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

28.

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

29.

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

30.

As fire when thrown into water is cooled down and put out, so also a false accusation when brought against a man of the purest and holiest character, boils over and is at once dissipated, and vanishes and threats of heaven and sea, himself standing unmoved.

Cicero, Marcus T.

31.

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

Reynolds, Sir Joshua

32.

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

Leneru, Marie

33.

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

Shakespeare, William

34.

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

Bovee, Christian Nevell

35.

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

36.

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.

37.

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

38.

One can acquire everything in solitude - except character.

Marie Henri Beyle

39.

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

40.

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

Haliburton, Thomas C.

41.

A rich man has no need of character.

Proverb, Hebrew

42.

Character is a by-product; it is produced in the great manufacture of daily duty.

Wilson, Woodrow T.

43.

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

Disraeli, Benjamin

44.

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

45.

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

Richter, Jean Paul

46.

The highest qualities of character must be earned.

Abbott, Lyman

47.

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

Bible

48.

I have only got down on to paper, really, three types of people: the person I think I am, the people who irritate me, and the people I'd like to be.