Motivational Quotes

Character

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

- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Best Quotes about Character

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

Haliburton, Thomas C.

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

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.

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

Gill, Vince

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

Bible

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

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

Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

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

Jefferson, Thomas

Character, not circumstances, makes the man.

Washington, Booker T.

10.

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

Ralph Waldo Emerson

11.

Put more trust in nobility of character than in an oath.

Solon

12.

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

13.

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

Michener, James A.

14.

Character is made by many acts; it may be lost by a single one.

15.

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

Reagan, Ronald

16.

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.

Forster, Edward M.

17.

Character is another thing that is formed in youth and reformed in marriage.

18.

If an ass goes traveling it will not come home a horse.

Proverb

19.

Too many lives are needed to make just one.

Montale, Eugenio

20.

Few people can distinguish the genuinely good from the reverse.

Juvenal, (Decimus Junius Juvenalis)

21.

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

Thomas, John M.

22.

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

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

23.

Surmounting difficulty is the crucible that forms character.

Robbins, Anthony

24.

Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

25.

One can acquire everything in solitude - except character.

Marie Henri Beyle

26.

Character is higher than intellect. A great soul will be strong to live as well as think.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

27.

Underneath this flabby exterior is an enormous lack of character.

Oscar Levant

28.

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

Francis Thompson

29.

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

Mason, John L.

30.

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

31.

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

Disraeli, Benjamin

32.

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

Elihu Burritt

33.

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

Royal, Darrell

34.

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

35.

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

36.

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

Voltaire

37.

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

Lincoln, Abraham

38.

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

Proverb, Chinese

39.

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.

40.

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

41.

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

Shakespeare, William

42.

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

Reynolds, Sir Joshua

43.

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

Richter, Jean Paul

44.

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

45.

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

46.

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

47.

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.

48.

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

Petrarch, Francesco

49.

The character of a man is known from his conversations.

Menander

50.

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