Motivational Quotes

Character

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

Best Quotes about Character

The empty vessel makes the loudest sound.

Shakespeare, William

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

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

Character is to man what carbon is to steel.

Hill, Napoleon

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

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

Proverb, Chinese

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

Gill, Vince

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

Proverb

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

10.

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

11.

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

Thurber, James

12.

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

13.

Character, not circumstances, makes the man.

Washington, Booker T.

14.

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

15.

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

Estrange, L.

16.

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

Ralph Waldo Emerson

17.

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

Solon

18.

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

19.

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

Maritain, Jacques

20.

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

21.

Good character is like a rubber ball -- thrown down hard -- it bounces right back. Good reputation is like a crystal ball -- thrown for gain -- shattered and cracked.

Linall Jr. A. L.

22.

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

23.

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

Bovee, Christian Nevell

24.

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

Crisp, Quentin

25.

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

Richter, Jean Paul

26.

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

Hepburn, Katharine

27.

It is better for the development of character and contentment to do certain things badly for yourself than to have them done better for you by someone else.

28.

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

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

29.

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

Elihu Burritt

30.

You are not very good if you are not better than your best friends imagine you to be.

Lavater, Johann Kaspar

31.

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

32.

Underneath this flabby exterior is an enormous lack of character.

Oscar Levant

33.

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

Guideposts

34.

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

35.

Old age and sickness bring out the essential characteristics of a man.

Frankfurter, Felix

36.

To have character is to be big enough to take life on.

Richards, Mary Caroline

37.

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

38.

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

39.

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.

40.

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

41.

Deep down, I'm pretty superficial.

Gardner, Ava

42.

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

Haliburton, Thomas C.

43.

Integrity has no need of rules.

Camus, Albert

44.

Fame is a vapor, popularity an accident, and riches take wings. Only one thing endures and that is character.

Greeley, Horace

45.

I look to a day when people will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.

King Jr. Martin Luther

46.

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

47.

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

48.

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

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

49.

Character is our destiny.

Heraclitus

50.

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

Wilson, Woodrow T.