Quotes on Character

The way we treat people we think can't help or hurt us - like housekeepers, waiters, and secretaries - tells more about our character than how we treat people we think are important. How we behave when we think no one is looking or when we don't think we will get caught more accurately portrays our character than what we say or do in service of our reputations.

Nature magically suits a man to his fortunes, by making them the fruit of his character.

If you really want to judge the character of a man, look not at his great performances. Watch a man do his most common actions.

In every man there is something wherein I may learn of him, and in that I am his pupil.

Remember that no talent, no self-denial, no brains, no character, are required to set up in the fault-finding business. Nothing external can have any power over you unless you permit it.

Discontent is want of self-reliance; it is infirmity of will.

The biggest mistake coaches make is taking borderline cases and trying to save them. I'm not talking about grades now, I'm talking about character. I want to know before a boy enrolls about his home life, and what his parents want him to be.

To arrive at a just estimate of a renowned man's character one must judge it by the standards of his time, not ours.

With all the power that a president has, the most important thing to bear in mind is this: You must not give power to a man unless, above everything else, he has character. Character is the most important qualification the president of the United States can have.

When your intelligence don't tell you something ain't right, your conscience gives you a tap you on the shoulder and says 'Hold on'. If it don't, you're a snake.

The true test of civilization is not the census, nor the size of cities, nor the crops - no, but the kind of man the country turns out.

If you will think about what you ought to do for other people, your character will take care of itself. Character is a by-product, and any man who devotes himself to its cultivation in his own case will become a selfish prig.

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

It's easy to say ''no!'' when there's a deeper ''yes!'' burning inside.

Commerce is of trivial import; love, faith, truth of character, the aspiration of man, these are sacred.

Good and evil lie close together. Seek no artistic unity in character.

Faced with crisis, the man of character falls back upon himself.

A time is marked not so much by ideas that are argued about as by ideas that are taken for granted. The character of an era hangs upon what needs no defense.

Obedience to lawful authority is the foundation of manly character.

Real courage is when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what.

When it was first proposed to establish laboratories at Cambridge, Todhunter, the mathematician, objected that it was unnecessary for students to see experiments performed, since the results could be vouched for by their teachers, all of them of the highest character, and many of them clergymen of the Church of England.