Motivational Quotes

Character

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

Best Quotes about Character

Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

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

Leneru, Marie

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

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

Maritain, Jacques

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

Character, not circumstances, makes the man.

Washington, Booker T.

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

Merikare

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

Elmer G. Letterman

My father told me that if you saw a man in a Rolls Royce you could be sure he was not a gentleman unless he was the chauffeur.

Arran, Earl of

10.

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

11.

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

Thackeray, William M.

12.

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

13.

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

Seneca

14.

One can acquire everything in solitude - except character.

Marie Henri Beyle

15.

A man's character is his fate.

Heraclitus

16.

Character is to man what carbon is to steel.

Hill, Napoleon

17.

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

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

18.

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

Freeman, Robert

19.

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

Disraeli, Benjamin

20.

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

Ralph Waldo Emerson

21.

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

Hay, Colin

22.

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

Shakespeare, William

23.

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

24.

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

Lippmann, Walter

25.

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

Karr, Alphonse

26.

They attack the one man with their hate and their shower of weapons. But he is like some rock which stretches into the vast sea and which, exposed to the fury of the winds and beaten against by the waves, endures all the violence

Virgil

27.

Character is that which reveals moral purpose, exposing the class of things a man chooses or avoids.

Aristotle

28.

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

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.

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

Petrarch, Francesco

31.

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

32.

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

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

33.

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

34.

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

35.

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

36.

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

37.

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

38.

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

Goldsmith, Oliver

39.

The character of a man is known from his conversations.

Menander

40.

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

41.

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

42.

Wherever man goes to dwell his character goes with him.

Proverb, African

43.

While an original is always hard to find, he is easy to recognize.

Mason, John L.

44.

Be thou incapable of change in that which is right, and men will rely upon thee. Establish unto thyself principles of action; and see that thou ever act according to them. First know that thy principles are just, and then be thou

Akhenaton

45.

I appreciate people who are civil, whether they mean it or not. I think: Be civil. Do not cherish your opinion over my feelings. There's a vanity to candor that isn't really worth it. Be kind.

Richard Greenberg

46.

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

Euripides

47.

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

Crisp, Quentin

48.

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

Fitzwater, P. B.

49.

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