Character Quotes - Page 8

You tell me that you sometimes view the dark side of your Diana, and there no doubt you discover many Spots which I rather wish were erased, than conceal'd from you. Do not judge by this, that your opinion is an indifferent thing to me, (were it so, I should look forward with a heavey Heart,) but it is far otherways, for I had rather stand fair there, and be thought well of by Lysander than by the greater part of the World besides. I would fain hope that those faults which you discover, proceed more, from a wrong Head, than a bad Heart. E'er long May I be connected with a Friend from whose Example I may form a more faultless conduct, and whose benevolent mind will lead him to pardon, what he cannot amend.

I don't only act out of my character; my character reacts to my actions. Each time I why, even if I'm not caught, I become a little bit more of this ugly thing: a liar. Character is always in the making, with each morally valenced action, whether right or wrong, affecting our characters, the people who we are.

The truth is that circumstances had done much to cultivate in Mrs. Tristram a marked tendency to irony. Her taste on many points differed from that of her husband, and though she made frequent concessions it must be confessed that her concessions were not always graceful. They were founded upon a vague project she had of some day doing something very positive, something a trifle passionate. What she meant to do she could by no means have told you; but meanwhile, nevertheless, she was buying a good conscience, by installments.

There are, basically, three kinds of people: the unsuccessful, the temporarily successful, and those who become and remain successful. The difference is character.

Character is contagious.

The dysfunction was not the character of one person, it was the split of family by divorce, with the ripples felt for eternity by bloodline.

My mother is quite the character. You'd hate her. Sometimes I think I hate her too, but mainly I feel sorry for her. Which is kind of worse.

Your private thoughts give birth to your public acts.

The best way to show that a stick is crooked is not to argue about it or to spend time denouncing it, but to lay a straight stick alongside it

It is only when one is under extreme duress that one's true character is revealed.

People must be just and fair, starting with what they thought.

What I took out of them was that character was measured by facing up to difficult situations and that a hero was a man who would not break even under the most trying circumstances.

I suppose there is a certain crucial interval in everyone's life when character is fixed forever.

The man who makes everything that leads to happiness depends upon himself, and not upon other men, has adopted the very best plan for living happily. This is the man of moderation, the man of manly character and of wisdom.

Affronts to her reputation pierced her to the heart, though I couldn’t understand why, since she had very little character left to defend.

And don’t forget, if you are very intelligent but load yourself with bad characters, nobody will follow you.

I had to have him, had to. Just the way I had to have everything I wanted; or had to do everything I'd ever wanted to do.

The growth of the imagination demands windows-windows through which we can look out at the world and windows through which we can look into ourselves. The old stories were windows in just this way.

Different narrative forms naturally lend themselves to different aspects of existence. The novel is ideal for presenting the inner lives of its characters, the play is ideal for showing people in a room talking and movies are ideal for showing large metal objects hurtling through the air.

People like you are the reason this album needed to be written in the first place. When you’ve got your salary, and your cosy little ivory tower, you’re dead happy to spout off about artistic integrity and us getting there together. But the minute you’re asked to back your promises up with some strength of character, you come apart. You say you love good music, but you can’t listen to it that carefully if you treat people like this.

One's character is set at an early age, son. The choices you make now will affect you for the rest of your life." He was quiet for a minute then dropped the curtain and said, "I hate to see you swim out so far you can't swim back.

As our fathers said, you can tell a ripe corn by its look.

Character- building education is what the world needs – education, that will empower the mind with such an unimaginable strength that one would meet death face to face and say “some other time, pal!

Personality can open doors, but only character can keep them open.

As in the universe every atom has an effect, however minuscule, on every other atom, so that to pinch the fabric of Time and Space at any point is to shake the whole length and breadth of it, so in fiction every element has effect on every other, so that to change a character's name from Jane to Cynthia is to make the fictional ground shudder under her feet.

Becoming a Leader of Character changes lives—our lives and the lives of the people we touch.

If we think of the novel and the epic...The difference lies in the fact that the important thing about the epic is a hero--a man who is a pattern for all men. While, as Mencken pointed out, the essence of most novels lies in the breaking down of a man, in the degeneration of character.

You have to push through every difficulty to have a breakthrough.

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

The man whose conscience never troubles him must have it pretty well trained.

My scars tell a story. They are a reminder of times when life tried to break me, but failed. They are markings of where the structure of my character was welded.

Talking to Robespierre, one tried to make the right noises; but what is right, these days? Address yourself to the militant, and you find a pacifist giving you a reproachful look. Address yourself to the idealist, and you’ll find that you’ve fallen into the company of a cheerful, breezy professional politician. Address yourself to means, and you’ll be told to think of ends: to ends, and you’ll be told to think of means. Make an assumption, and you will find it overturned; offer yesterday’s conviction, and today you’ll find it shredded. What did Mirabeau complain of? He believes everything he says. Presumably there was some layer of Robespierre, some deep stratum, where all the contradictions were resolved.

If I take care of my character my reputation will take care of itself.

You only really get to know a person after a fight. Only then can you judge their true character

Times will change for the better when you change.

Standard is not the money you have nor the creed you belong to ,truly IT IS CHARACTER......

It takes a man of unusual character to openly confront his own shortcomings. It’s so much more convenient to blame others.

Developing the man within creates invisible changes in a man’s character

The gap between intentions and actions is character.

Everybody has good and bad forces working with them, against them, and within them.

One of the Christian's biggest fears is appearing 'too Christian'. God forbid, because that's often characterized as god-awful! We want to be one, but without being 'one of them'.

People that hold onto hate for so long do so because they want to avoid dealing with their pain. They falsely believe if they forgive they are letting their enemy believe they are a doormat. What they don’t understand is hatred can’t be isolated or turned off. It manifests in their health, choices and belief systems. Their values and religious beliefs make adjustments to justify their negative emotions. Not unlike malware infesting a hard drive, their spirit slowly becomes corrupted and they make choices that don’t make logical sense to others. Hatred left unaddressed will crash a person’s spirit. The only thing he or she can do is to reboot, by fixing him or herself, not others. This might require installing a firewall of boundaries or parental controls on their emotions. Regardless of the approach, we are all connected on this "network of life" and each of us is responsible for cleaning up our spiritual registry.

Her flesh was powdery and voluptuously weary, as if tenderized by all the different beds and arms in which she had lain. Her face was as soft as the pulpy flash of an overripe banana, her breasts like two tiny bunches of grapes. She exuded a certain seedy charm, a poetry of premature corruption and decay. She breathed the air as if it burned her palate, baking her small, hot, whorish mouth. It was as if she were sucking a sweet or slurping champagne.

When everything seems to be lacking integrity, you find it in yourself.

Not in the clamor of the crowded street Not in the shouts and plaudits of the throng But in ourselves are triumph and defeat.

If we women were particular about men's characters, we should never get married at all.

A man's character is only formed after the impressions of childhood and early youth have become blended with the indefinable and hidden influences both atavistic and of more immediate heredity. When, like soft clay, the newborn human spirit has been first fashioned by the firm hand of the modeller and then allowed to set and harden, this is the moment of the final character emerges, fixed for life. While the part played by heredity will always remains elusive and uncertain, the influence of a man's early years are not difficult to unfurl if we know where to seek and consider seriously what we find.

A man of fifty is responsible for his face.

You have to descend to the valley of humility to climb to heights of character.

Character is a lack of doubt, character is stubbornly persevering in an intention no matter how senseless it is, character is a lack of imagination, character is inborn dullness, character is the misfortune of humanity.

My mother likes odd numbers and is suspicious of the even ones. She reads a new book every week and is bewitched by black holes in the universe. She describes herself as an optimist but she worries about everything—worries incessantly—worries on behalf of others when she feels they are not worrying adequately for themselves.And my mother misses her own mother, my grandmother, immensely, who only has a past now; who is only allowed to be as we remember her.

First, create your ego. Then destroy it. This is all of life.

What's in a name?  The accumulation of reputations from all who've owned it before you.

Character is like 'Structural Integrity' in the field of engineering.A construction is believed to have structural integrity when it can withstand 'impact' from anywhere and anything, functioning adequately for its desired purposes and service life, until a physical collapse proves otherwise.'Integrity' springs from the original Latin root 'integrum', which means "Intact".A man has INTEGRITY when he remains INTACT, despite the IMPACT of forces that seek to sidetrack him.He will never confuse "what is" with "what ought to be", EVEN WHEN "what is" will work in his favour.A man who will choose, not what the world forces his hands to choose, but what aligns with his destiny and will propel him to become what he is meant to become.Such men are few, such men should be me and you.

Character is doing the right thing when nobody’s looking. There are too many people who think that the only thing that’s right is to get by,and the only thing that’s wrong is to get caught.

...The happy Warrior... is he... whose powers shed round him in the common strife, or mild concerns of ordinary life, a constant influence, a peculiar grace; but who, if he be called upon to face some awful moment to which Heaven has joined great issues, good or bad for human kind, is happy as a lover; and attired with sudden brightness, like a man inspired; and, through the heat of conflict, keeps the law in calmness made, and sees what he foresaw; or if an unexpected call succeed, come when it will, is equal to the need: he who, though thus endued as with a sense and faculty for storm and turbulence, is yet a soul whose master-bias leans to homefelt pleasures and to gentle scenes; sweet images! which, wheresoe'er he be, are at his heart; and such fidelity it is his darling passion to approve; more brave for this, that he hath much to love:—

In the books, I meet characters which I really like and I think that they are like me... but so far I haven't met them in real life!

People are rarely what they first appear—good, bad, or otherwise.

In leadership, skills may take you where character won't keep you.

The truth of who you are and what you believe is projected in your behavior. Everything else, either positive or negative, is a mix of stories, lies, delusions, and manipulations.