82+ Best Character Quotes: Exclusive Selection

Character traits are valued aspects of a person’s behavior, both good and bad. Inspirational character quotes will challenge the way you think, and help guide you through any life experience.

If you’re searching for best quotation ever to share with the people you love or just want to feel inspired yourself, browse through an amazing collection of people quotes, awesome quotes about change and motivational education quotes.

Famous Character Quotes

Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.  Martin Luther King Jr.

Hard conditions of life are indispensable to bringing out the best in human personality. Alexis Carrel

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved. Helen Keller

Our ability to handle life’s challenges is a measure of our strength of character. Les Brown

What we call our destiny is truly our character and that character can be altered. The knowledge that we are responsible for our actions and attitudes does not need to be discouraging, because it also means that we are free to change this destiny. Anais Nin

Be sure you put your feet in the right place, then stand firm. Abraham Lincoln

The best index to a person’s character is how he treats people who can’t do him any good, and how he treats people who can’t fight back.  Abigail van Buren

This is no time for ease and comfort. It is time to dare and endure. Winston Churchill

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

He who conquers others is strong; He who conquers himself is mighty. Lao Tzu

In the end, it is the person you become, not the things you achieve, that is most important.  Les Brown

Courage is fear holding on a minute longer. George S. Patton

Character is one of the greatest motive powers in the world. In its noblest embodiments, it exemplifies human nature in its highest forms, for it exhibits man at his best. Samuel Smiles

Sometimes I wonder if I’m a character being written, or if I’m writing myself. Marilyn Manson

Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do. But it takes character and self control to be understanding and forgiving. Dale Carnegie

Character is simply habit long continued. Plutarch

Knowledge will give you power, but character earns respect.  Bruce Lee

An individual step in character training is to put responsibility on the individual. Robert Baden  Powell

Intelligence plus character  that is the goal of true education. Martin Luther King Jr.

Character isn’t something you were born with and can’t change, like your fingerprints. It’s something you weren’t born with and must take responsibility for forming. Jim Rohn

Show me a man with a tattoo and I’ll show you a man with an interesting past. Jack London

No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path. Buddha

Mental toughness is many things and rather difficult to explain. Its qualities are sacrifice and self denial. Also, most importantly, it is combined with a perfectly disciplined will that refuses to give in. It’s a state of mind  you could call it character in action. Vince Lombardi

We continue to shape our personality all our life. If we knew ourselves perfectly, we should die. Albert Camus

Some are blessed with physical and mental facility, but none are more prized than the one who has developed true character.  Greg Henry Quinn

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved. Helen Keller

Generosity of character is important. It builds confidence by reminding you that you are a decent human being, and that you deserve any good things which might come your way. John Franz

The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character  that is the goal of true education. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Your reputation is in the hands of others. That’s what a reputation is. You can’t control that. The only thing you can control is your character.  Wayne W. Dyer

Just as we develop our physical muscles through overcoming opposition  such as lifting weights  we develop our character muscles by overcoming challenges and adversity. Stephen Covey

Character is not cut in marble  it is not something solid and unalterable. It is something living and changing, and may become diseased as our bodies do.  George Eliot

Life is a series of experiences, each one of which makes us bigger, even though sometimes it is hard to realize this. For the world was built to develop character, and we must learn that the setbacks and grieves which we endure help us in our marching onward. Henry Ford

I am no bird; and no net ensnares me I am a free human being with an independent will. Charlotte Brontë

It was character that got us out of bed, commitment that moved us into action, and discipline that enabled us to follow through. Zig Ziglar

The best index to a person’s character is how he treats people who can’t do him any good, and how he treats people who can’t fight back. Abigail Van Buren

Character, in the long run, is the decisive factor in the life of an individual and of nations alike. Theodore Roosevelt

Courage is the most important of all the virtues because without courage, you can’t practice any other virtue consistently. Maya Angelou

People grow through experience if they meet life honestly and courageously. This is how character is built. Eleanor Roosevelt

Confront the dark parts of yourself, and work to banish them with illumination and forgiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing. August Wilson

You will never do anything in this world without courage. It is the greatest quality of the mind next to honor. Aristotle

If you want to find out what a man is to the bottom, give him power. Any man can stand adversity only a great man can stand prosperity. It is the glory of Abraham Lincoln that he never abused power only on the side of mercy. Robert Ingersoll

We are like chameleons, we take our hue and the color of our moral character, from those who are around us. John Locke

Whatever you are physically male or female, strong or weak, ill or healthy all those things matter less than what your heart contains. If you have the soul of a warrior, you are a warrior. All those other things, they are the glass that contains the lamp, but you are the light inside. Cassandra Clare

Good character is not formed in a week or a month. It is created little by little, day by day. Protracted and patient effort is needed to develop good character. Heraclitus

Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters. Albert Einstein

Character is determined more by the lack of certain experiences than by those one has had. Friedrich Nietzsche

In the end you should always do the right thing even if it’s hard. Nicholas Sparks

You have power over your mind not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength. Marcus Aurelius

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

One isn’t necessarily born with courage, but one is born with potential. Without courage, we cannot practice any other virtue with consistency. We can’t be kind, true, merciful, generous, or honest. Maya Angelou

Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are. John Wooden

You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along. Eleanor Roosevelt

Grudges are for those who insist that they are owed something; forgiveness, however, is for those who are substantial enough to move on. Criss Jami

I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear. Nelson Mandela

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired, and success achieved. Helen Keller

Such as are your habitual thoughts, such also will be the character of your mind; for the soul is dyed by the thoughts. Marcus Aurelius

Which of us has not felt that the character we are reading in the printed page is more real than the person standing beside us? Cornelia Funke

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

You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Weakness of attitude becomes weakness of character. Albert Einstein

It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare. Mark Twain

Persuasion is achieved by the speaker’s personal character when the speech is so spoken as to make us think him credible. We believe good men more fully and more readily than others this is true generally whatever the question is, and absolutely true where exact certainty is impossible and opinions are divided. Aristotle

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. Martin Luther King Jr.

How few there are who have courage enough to own their faults, or resolution enough to mend them. Benjamin Franklin

All men make mistakes, but a good man yields when he knows his course is wrong, and repairs the evil. The only crime is pride. Sophocles

Great ambition is the passion of a great character. Those endowed with it may perform very good or very bad acts. All depends on the principles which direct them. Napoleon Bonaparte

It is better to be alone than in bad company. George Washington

Human greatness does not lie in wealth or power, but in character and goodness. People are just people, and all people have faults and shortcomings, but all of us are born with a basic goodness. Anne Frank

You can judge a man’s true character by the way he treats his fellow animals. Paul McCartney

When we see persons of worth, we should think of equaling them; when we see persons of a contrary character, we should turn inwards and examine ourselves. Confucius

I would rather be a little nobody, then to be a evil somebody. Abraham Lincoln

Admitting one’s own faults is the first step to changing them, and it is a demonstration of true bravery and integrity.  Philip Johnson

To educate a person in the mind but not in morals is to educate a menace to society. Theodore Roosevelt

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

A man’s true character comes out when he’s drunk. Charlie Chaplin

Develop your character so that you are a person of integrity. Peter Cain

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

Conduct reveals character, and we best understand integrity when we see it lived out in a person’s life. Charles H. Dyer

Character is like a tree and reputation its shadow. The shadow is what we think it is and the tree is the real thing. Abraham Lincoln

I hope you enjoy reading this collection of profound character quotes. Let me know which one you like most.