Motivational Quotes

Character

Character is to man what carbon is to steel.

- Hill, Napoleon

Best Quotes about Character

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

Ausonius, Decimus Magnus

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

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

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

Guideposts

Deep down, I'm pretty superficial.

Gardner, Ava

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

Confucius

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

Hepburn, Katharine

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

Character is our destiny.

Heraclitus

The superior man will watch over himself when he is alone. He examines his heart that there may be nothing wrong there, and that he may have no cause of dissatisfaction with himself.

Confucius

10.

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

11.

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

Marden, Orison Swett

12.

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

13.

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

14.

Character, not circumstances, makes the man.

Washington, Booker T.

15.

Character development is the aim of education.

O'Shea

16.

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

Angelou, Maya

17.

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.

18.

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.

19.

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

Aristotle

20.

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

21.

Fame is what you have taken, character is what you give. When to this truth you awaken, then you begin to live.

Taylor, Bayard

22.

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

23.

Few people can distinguish the genuinely good from the reverse.

Juvenal, (Decimus Junius Juvenalis)

24.

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

Tacitus, Publius Cornelius

25.

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

Shakespeare, William

26.

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

Horace

27.

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

Voltaire

28.

Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

29.

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

Goldsmith, Oliver

30.

Character develops itself in the stream of life.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

31.

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.

32.

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

33.

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

Thoreau, Henry David

34.

The four cornerstones of character on which the structure of this nation was built are: initiative, imagination, individuality, and independence.

Rickenbacker, Edward Vernon

35.

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

36.

You must regulate your life by the standards you admire when you are at your best.

Thomas, John M.

37.

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

Royal, Darrell

38.

Be more concerned with your character than your reputation. Your character is what you really are while your reputation is merely what others think you are.

Wooden, John

39.

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

Richter, Jean Paul

40.

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

Lippmann, Walter

41.

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

Elihu Burritt

42.

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

Thackeray, William M.

43.

You can tell a lot about a fellow's character by his way of eating jelly beans.

Reagan, Ronald

44.

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

Merikare

45.

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

Reynolds, Sir Joshua

46.

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

Bible

47.

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

48.

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

49.

A man's character is his fate.

Heraclitus

50.

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