# Quotes about character - Quotes: 35 - Authors: 13 - Broader topic: [Quotes about human nature](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/human-nature.md) - Topic page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character ## Quotes > It is difficult to paint the light, the various, the inconstant character of Gallienus, which he displayed without constraint, as soon as he became sole possessor of the empire. In every art that he attempted, his lively genius enabled him to succeed; and as his genius was destitute of judgment, he attempted every art, except the important ones of war and government. He was a master of several curious, but useless sciences, a ready orator, an elegant poet, a skilful gardener, an excellent cook, and most contemptible prince... There were, however, a few short moments in the life of Gallienus, when, exasperated by some recent injury, he suddenly appeared the intrepid soldier and the cruel tyrant; till, satiated with blood, or fatigued by resistance, he insensibly sunk into the natural mildness and indolence of his character. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Topics: [power](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/power.md), [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > But the genius of Constantine himself had been formed by adversity and experience. In the free intercourse of private life, and amidst the dangers of the court of Galerius, he had learned to command his own passions, to encounter those of his equals, and to depend for his present safety and future greatness on the prudence and firmness of his personal conduct. His destined successors had the misfortune of being born and educated in the Imperial purple. Incessantly surrounded with a train of flatterers, they passed their youth in the enjoyment of luxury and the expectation of a throne... The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > Vitellius consumed in mere eating, at least six millions of our money in about seven months. It is not easy to express his vices with dignity, or even decency. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > Clodius Albinus surpassed both his competitors in the nobility of his extraction. Which he derived from the most illustrious names of the old Republic, but the branch from which he claimed descent had long sunk into mean circumstances, and transplanted into a remote province. It is difficult to form a just idea of his character. Under the philisophic cloak of austerity, he stands accused of concealing most of the vices which degrade human nature. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md), [appearances](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/appearances.md) > Cimourdain was a pure-minded but gloomy man. He had "the absolute" within him. He had been a priest, which is a solemn thing. Man may have, like the sky, a dark and impenetrable serenity; that something should have caused night to fall in his soul is all that is required. Priesthood had been the cause of night within Cimourdain. Once a priest, always a priest. > > Whatever causes night in our souls may leave stars. Cimourdain was full of virtues and truth, but they shine out of a dark background. [Victor Hugo](https://www.leafyquotes.com/victor-hugo.md) · [Ninety-Three](https://www.leafyquotes.com/victor-hugo/ninety-three.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/victor-hugo/ninety-three/cimourdain-was-a-pure-minded.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > Clive was a man of the same type as Cromwell or Bunyan, or, for the matter of that, Johnson—that is, he was a strong, sensible man with a kind of running spring of hysteria and melancholy in him. [G. Chesterton](https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton.md) · [Heretics](https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton/heretics.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton/heretics/clive-was-a-man.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > Every man, however brave, who begins by worshipping violence, must end in mere timidity. Every man, however wise, who begins by worshipping success, must end in mere mediocrity. [G. Chesterton](https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton.md) · [Heretics](https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton/heretics.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton/heretics/every-man-however.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md), [success and failure](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/success-and-failure.md) > The practical reformer has continually to demand that changes be made in things which are supported by powerful and widely-spread feelings, or to question the apparent necessity and indefeasibleness of established facts; and it is often an indispensable part of his argument to show, how these powerful feelings had their origin, and how those facts came to seem necessary and indefeasible. There is therefore a natural hostility between him and a philosophy which discourages the explanation of feelings and moral facts by circumstances and association, and prefers to treat them as ultimate elements of human nature; a philosophy which is addicted to holding up favorite doctrines as intuitive truths, and deems intuition to be the voice of Nature and of God, speaking with an authority higher than that of our reason. In particular, I have long felt that the prevailing tendency to regard all the marked distinctions of human character as innate, and in the main indelible, and to ignore the irresistible proofs that by far the greater part of those differences, whether between individuals, races, or sexes, are such as not only might but naturally would be produced by differences in circumstances, is one of the chief hindrances to the rational treatment of great social questions, and one of the greatest stumbling blocks to human improvement. Autobiography · p. 273 Topics: [society](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/society.md), [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md), [change](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/change.md) > The dissatisfaction with life and the world, felt more or less in the present state of society and intellect by every discerning and highly conscientious mind, gave in his case a rather melancholy tinge to the character, very natural to those whose passive moral susceptibilities are more than proportioned to their active energies. For it must be said, that the strength of will of which his manner seemed to give such strong assurance, expended itself principally in manner. With great zeal for human improvement, a strong sense of duty and capacities and acquirements the extent of which is proved by the writings he has left, he hardly ever completed any intellectual task of magnitude. He had so high a standard of what ought to be done, so exaggerated a sense of deficiencies in his own performances, and was so unable to content himself with the amount of elaboration sufficient for the occasion and the purpose, that he not only spoilt much of his work for ordinary use by over-labouring it, but spent so much time and exertion in superfluous study and thought, that when his task ought to have been completed, he had generally worked himself into an illness, without having half finished what he undertook. From this mental infirmity (of which he is not the sole example among the accomplished and able men whom I have known), combined with liability to frequent attacks of disabling though not dangerous ill-health, he accomplished, through life, little in comparison with what he seemed capable of... Autobiography · p. 74 Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > It is not to be supposed that she was, or that any one, at the age at which I first saw her, could be, all that she afterwards became. Least of all could this be true of her, with whom self-improvement, progress in the highest and in all senses, was a law of her nature; a necessity equally from the ardour with which she sought it, and from the spontaneous tendency of faculties which could not receive an impression or an experience without making it the source or the occasion of an accession of wisdom. Up to the time when I first saw her, her rich and powerful nature had chiefly unfolded itself according to the received type of feminine genius. To her outer circle she was a beauty and a wit, with an air of natural distinction, felt by all who approached her: to the inner, a woman of deep and strong feeling, of penetrating and intuitive intelligence, and of an eminently meditative and poetic nature. Autobiography · p. 185 Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > I soon perceived that she possessed in combination, the qualities which in all other persons whom I had known I had been only too happy to find singly. In her, complete emancipation from every kind of superstition (including that which attributes a pretended perfection to the order of nature and the universe), and an earnest protest against many things which are still part of the established constitution of society, resulted not from the hard intellect, but from strength of noble and elevated feeling, and co-existed with a highly reverential nature. Autobiography · p. 186 Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > [L]ike Coleridge, he might plead as a set-off that he had been to many persons, through his conversation, a source not only of much instruction but of great elevation of character. On me his influence was most salutary. It was moral in the best sense. He took a sincere and kind interest in me, far beyond what could have been expected towards a mere youth from a man of his age, standing, and what seemed austerity of character. There was in his conversation and demeanour a tone of high-mindedness which did not show itself so much, if the quality existed as much, in any of the other persons with whom at that time I associated. My intercourse with him was the more beneficial, owing to his being of a different mental type from all other intellectual men whom I frequented... Autobiography · p. 75 Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > He blamed as severely what he thought a bad action, when the motive was a feeling of duty, as if the agents had been consciously evil doers. He would not have accepted as a plea in mitigation for inquisitors, that they sincerely believed burning heretics to be an obligation of conscience. But though he did not allow honesty of purpose to soften his disapprobation of actions, it had its full effect on his estimation of characters. No one prized conscientiousness and rectitude of intention more highly, or was more incapable of valuing any person in whom he did not feel assurance of it. Autobiography · p. 49 Topics: [morality](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/morality.md), [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > My father's moral inculcations were at all times mainly those of the "Socratici viri;" justice, temperance (to which he gave a very extended application), veracity, perseverance, readiness to encounter pain and especially labour; regard for the public good; estimation of persons according to their merits, and of things according to their intrinsic usefulness; a life of exertion in contradiction to one of self-indulgent sloth. These and other moralities he conveyed in brief sentences, uttered as occasion arose, of grave exhortation, or stern reprobation and contempt. > > But though direct moral teaching does much, indirect does more; and the effect my father produced on my character, did not depend solely on what he said or did with that direct object, but also, and still more, on what manner of man he was. Autobiography · p. 47 Topics: [morality](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/morality.md), [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > Alike in the highest regions of speculation and in the smaller practical concerns of daily life, her mind was the same perfect instrument, piercing to the very heart and marrow of the matter; always seizing the essential idea or principle. The same exactness and rapidity of operation, pervading as it did her sensitive as well as her mental faculties, would, with her gifts of feeling and imagination, have fitted her to be a consummate artist, as her fiery and tender soul and her vigorous eloquence would certainly have made her a great orator, and her profound knowledge of human nature and discernment and sagacity in practical life, would, in the times when such a carrière was open to women, have made her eminent among the rulers of mankind. Her intellectual gifts did but minister to a moral character at once the noblest and the best balanced which I have ever met with in life. Autobiography · p. 186 Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md), [talent](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/talent.md) > The influence of Charles Austin over me differed from that of the persons I have hitherto mentioned, in being not the influence of a man over a boy, but that of an elder contemporary. It was through him that I first felt myself, not a pupil under teachers, but a man among men. He was the first person of intellect whom I met on a ground of equality, though as yet much his inferior on that common ground. He was a man who never failed to impress greatly those with whom he came in contact, even when their opinions were the very reverse of his. The impression he gave was that of boundless strength, together with talents which, combined with such apparent force of will and character, seemed capable of dominating the world. Those who knew him, whether friendly to him or not, always anticipated that he would play a conspicuous part in public life. It is seldom that men produce so great an immediate effect by speech, unless they, in some degree, lay themselves out for it; and he did this in no ordinary degree. He loved to strike, and even to startle. He knew that decision is the greatest element of effect, and he uttered his opinions with all the decision he could throw into them, never so well pleased as when he astonished any one by their audacity. Autobiography · p. 77 Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > I consequently remained long, and in a less degree have always remained, inexpert in anything requiring manual dexterity; my mind as well as my hands, did its work very lamely when it was applied, or ought to have been applied, to the practical details which, as they are the chief interest of life to the majority of men, are also the things in which whatever mental capacity they have, chiefly shows itself: I was constantly meriting reproof by inattention, inobservance, and general slackness of mind in matters of daily life. My father was the extreme opposite in these particulars: his senses and mental faculties were always on the alert; he carried decision and energy of character in his whole manner and into every action of life: and this, as much as his talents, contributed to the strong impression which he always made upon those with whom he came into personal contact. But the children of energetic parents, frequently grow up unenergetic, because they lean on their parents, and the parents are energetic for them. Autobiography · p. 36 Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > 'But we should kill him!' > > 'No. You've been listen to Brocando too often,' said Bane. > > Brocando bristled. 'You know what he is! Why not kill--' he began, but he was interrupted. > > 'Because it doesn't matter what he is. It matters what we are.' [Terry Pratchett](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett.md) · [The Carpet People](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/the-carpet-people.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/the-carpet-people/but-we-should.md) Topics: [morality](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/morality.md), [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > To him, a stilted geometric love of arrangement was “system,” an indefatigable and feverish interest in the pettiest facets of day-to-day bureaucracy was “industry,” indecision when right was “caution,” and blind stubbornness when wrong, “determination.” [Isaac Asimov](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov.md) · [Foundation and Empire](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/foundation-and-empire.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/foundation-and-empire/to-him-a-stilted.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > 'I'm glad to know he's [Paneloux] better than his sermon.' [Albert Camus](https://www.leafyquotes.com/albert-camus.md) · [The Plague](https://www.leafyquotes.com/albert-camus/the-plague.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/albert-camus/the-plague/im-glad-to-know.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > Oh for a man who is a man, and, as my neighbor says, has a bone in his back which you cannot pass your hand through! Civil Disobedience Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md), [courage](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/courage.md) > Ancestors do not mean so much. The rebel who succeeds generally makes it easier for the posterity that follows him; so these descendants are usually contented and smug and soft. Rebels are made from life, not ancestors. The Story Of My Life Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > The fact is, the king was a good deal more than a king, he was a man; and when a man is a man, you can’t knock it out of him. [Mark Twain](https://www.leafyquotes.com/mark-twain.md) · [A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court](https://www.leafyquotes.com/mark-twain/a-connecticut-yankee-in-king-arthurs-court.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/mark-twain/a-connecticut-yankee-in-king-arthurs-court/the-fact-is-the.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > For legislators make the citizens good by forming habits in them, and this is the wish of every legislator, and those who do not effect it miss their mark, and it is in this that a good constitution differs from a bad one. [Aristotle](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle.md) · [Nicomachean Ethics](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics/for-legislators-make.md) Topics: [politics](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/politics.md), [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > The truly good and wise man will bear all kinds of fortune in a seemly way, and will always act in the noblest manner that the circumstances allow. [Aristotle](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle.md) · [Nicomachean Ethics](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics/the-truly-good.md) Topics: [morality](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/morality.md), [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > .... In a word, acts of any kind produce habits or characters of the same kind. Hence we ought to make sure that our acts are of a certain kind; for the resulting character varies as they vary. It makes no small difference, therefore, whether a man be trained in his youth up in this way or that, but a great difference, or rather all the difference. [Aristotle](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle.md) · [Nicomachean Ethics](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics/in-a-word.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > It is well said, then, that it is by doing just acts that the just man is produced, and by doing temperate acts the temperate man; without doing these no one would have even a prospect of becoming good. But most people do not do these, but take refuge in theory and think they are being philosophers and will become good in this way, behaving somewhat like patients who listen attentively to their doctors, but do none of the things they are ordered to do. [Aristotle](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle.md) · [Nicomachean Ethics](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics/it-is-well.md) Topics: [morality](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/morality.md), [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > The vices respectively fall short of or exceed what is right in both passions and actions, while virtue both finds and chooses that which is intermediate. [Aristotle](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle.md) · [Nicomachean Ethics](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics/the-vices-respectively.md) Topics: [morality](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/morality.md), [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > After these matters we ought perhaps next to discuss pleasure. For it is thought to be most intimately connected with our human nature, which is the reason why in educating the young we steer them by the rudders of pleasure and pain; it is thought, too, that to enjoy the things we ought and to hate the things we ought has the greatest bearing on virtue of character. For these things extend right through life, with a weight and power of their own in respect both to virtue and to the happy life, since men choose what is pleasant and avoid what is painful; and such things, it will be thought, we should least of all omit to discuss, especially since they admit of much dispute. [Aristotle](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle.md) · [Nicomachean Ethics](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics/after-these-matters.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > Therefore only an utterly senseless person can fail to know that our characters are the result of our conduct. [Aristotle](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle.md) · [Nicomachean Ethics](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/nicomachean-ethics/therefore-only-an-utterly.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > Music directly represents the passion of the soul. If one listens to the wrong kind of music, he will become the wrong kind of person. [Aristotle](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle.md) · [Metaphysics](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/metaphysics.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/aristotle/metaphysics/music-directly-represents.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md), [music](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/music.md) > There were many women at that time, upon whom the time laid a dreadfully disfiguring hand; but, there was not one among them more to be dreaded than this ruthless woman [Madame Defarge], now taking her way along the streets. Of a strong and fearless character, of shrewd sense and readiness, of great determination, of that kind of beauty which not only seems to impart to its possessor firmness and animosity, but to strike into others an instinctive recognition of those qualities; the troubled time would have heaved her up, under any circumstances. But, imbued from her childhood with a brooding sense of wrong, and an inveterate hatred of a class, opportunity had developed her into a tigress. She was absolutely without pity. [Charles Dickens](https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens.md) · [A Tale of Two Cities](https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/a-tale-of-two-cities.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/a-tale-of-two-cities/there-were-many.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md), [hatred](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/hatred.md) > The strong man holds in a living blend strongly marked opposites. The idealists are usually not realistic, and the realists are not usually idealistic. The militant are not generally known to be passive, nor the passive to be militant. Seldom are the humble self-assertive, or the self-assertive humble. But life at its best is a creative synthesis of opposites in fruitful harmony. The philosopher Hegel said that truth is found neither in the thesis nor the antithesis, but in the emergent synthesis which reconciles the two. [Martin Luther King, Jr.](https://www.leafyquotes.com/martin-luther-king-jr.md) · [Strength to Love](https://www.leafyquotes.com/martin-luther-king-jr/strength-to-love.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/martin-luther-king-jr/strength-to-love/the-strong-man.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md) > The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. The true neighbor will risk his position, his prestige and even his life for the welfare of others. [Martin Luther King, Jr.](https://www.leafyquotes.com/martin-luther-king-jr.md) · [Strength to Love](https://www.leafyquotes.com/martin-luther-king-jr/strength-to-love.md) · p. 25 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/martin-luther-king-jr/strength-to-love/the-ultimate-measure.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md), [courage](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/courage.md) > Jesus recognized the need for blending opposites. He knew that his disciples would face a difficult and hostile world, where they would confront the recalcitrance of political officials and the intransigence of the protectors of the old order. He knew that they would meet cold and arrogant men whose hearts had been hardened by the long winter of traditionalism. ... And he gave them a formula for action, "Be ye therefore as wise as serpents, and harmless as doves." ... We must combine the toughness of the serpent with the softness of the dove, a tough mind and a tender heart. [Martin Luther King, Jr.](https://www.leafyquotes.com/martin-luther-king-jr.md) · [Strength to Love](https://www.leafyquotes.com/martin-luther-king-jr/strength-to-love.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/martin-luther-king-jr/strength-to-love/jesus-recognized-the.md) Topics: [character](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/character.md), [wisdom](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/wisdom.md)