Motivational Quotes

Character

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

- Hepburn, Katharine

Best Quotes about Character

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

Not to be cheered by praise, not to be grieved by blame, but to know thoroughly ones own virtues or powers are the characteristics of an excellent man.

Pandita, Saskya

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

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.

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

Disraeli, Benjamin

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

If you stand straight, do not fear a crooked shadow.

Proverb, Chinese

Surmounting difficulty is the crucible that forms character.

Robbins, Anthony

The character of a man is known from his conversations.

Menander

10.

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

11.

I could never think well of a man's intellectual or moral character, if he was habitually unfaithful to his appointments.

Nathaniel Emmons

12.

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

13.

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

Chambers, Oswald

14.

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

Richter, Jean Paul

15.

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

16.

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

17.

Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.

Abraham Lincoln

18.

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

Michener, James A.

19.

One can acquire everything in solitude - except character.

Marie Henri Beyle

20.

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

Tacitus, Publius Cornelius

21.

A rich man has no need of character.

Proverb, Hebrew

22.

Pity the man who has a character to support --it is worse than a large family -- he is silent poor indeed.

Thoreau, Henry David

23.

We should be too big to take offense and too noble to give it.

Lincoln, Abraham

24.

Our character is basically a composite of our habits. Because they are consistent, often unconcious patterns, they constantly, daily, express our character

Covey, Stephen R.

25.

The higher character a person supports the more they should regard their smallest actions.

26.

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

Voltaire

27.

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

Proverb

28.

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

29.

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

30.

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

31.

Some people are born hammers, others anvils.

Proverb

32.

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

33.

During my eighty-seven years, I have witnessed a whole succession of technological revolutions. But none of them has done away with the need for character in the individual or the ability to think.

Baruch, Bernard M.

34.

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

35.

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

36.

A man without ethics is a wild beast loosed upon this world.

Hall, Manly

37.

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

38.

It is well for the world that in most of us, by the age of thirty, the character has set like plaster, and will never soften again.

James, William

39.

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

Chesterfield, Lord

40.

There is never a better measure of what a person is than what he does when he is absolutely free to choose.

Bulger, William M.

41.

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

42.

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

Baldwin, Faith

43.

The man who cannot believe in himself cannot believe in anything else. The basis of all integrity and character is whatever faith we have in our own integrity.

Smith, Roy L.

44.

The best index to a person's character is (a) how he treats people who can't do him any good, and (b) how he treats people who can't fight back.

Buren, Abigail Van

45.

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

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

46.

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

47.

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

Hermann Hesse

48.

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.

49.

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.

50.

You cannot dream yourself into a character; you must hammer and forge yourself one.

James A. Froude