Motivational Quotes

Character

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

- Elihu Burritt

Best Quotes about Character

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.

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

Crisp, Quentin

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

Euripides

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

Jefferson, Thomas

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

Men of genius are admired, men of wealth are envied, men of power are feared; but only men of character are trusted.

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

Gill, Vince

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.

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

Lavater, Johann Kaspar

10.

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

Disraeli, Benjamin

11.

Wherever man goes to dwell his character goes with him.

Proverb, African

12.

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.

13.

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.

14.

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

Hay, Colin

15.

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

Reagan, Ronald

16.

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

Baldwin, Faith

17.

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

Rickenbacker, Edward Vernon

18.

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.

19.

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

Frankfurter, Felix

20.

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

Petrarch, Francesco

21.

You don't get in life what you want; you get in life what you are.

Brown, Les

22.

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

23.

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

24.

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

Freeman, Robert

25.

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

26.

Your character will be what you yourself choose to make it.

Lubbock, Sir John

27.

The empty vessel makes the loudest sound.

Shakespeare, William

28.

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

Goldsmith, Oliver

29.

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

Proverb

30.

The measure of a man's real character is what he would do if he knew he would never be found out.

Macaulay, Thomas B.

31.

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

32.

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

33.

Strong feelings do not necessarily make a strong character. The strength of a man is to be measured by the power of the feelings he subdues not by the power of those which subdue him.

William Carleton

34.

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

Thackeray, William M.

35.

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

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

36.

Few people can distinguish the genuinely good from the reverse.

Juvenal, (Decimus Junius Juvenalis)

37.

Character is victory organized.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

38.

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

39.

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

Chambers, Oswald

40.

We know but a few men, a great many coats and breeches.

Thoreau, Henry David

41.

A good character is the best tombstone. Those who loved you, and were helped by you, will remember you when forget-me-nots are withered. Carve your name on hearts, and not on marble

Spurgeon, Charles Haddon

42.

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.

43.

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

Fitzwater, P. B.

44.

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

45.

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

46.

Too many lives are needed to make just one.

Montale, Eugenio

47.

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

48.

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

Ausonius, Decimus Magnus

49.

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

50.

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