Quotes about Character

Have I placed more value on my status or title than on my character? What perceptions do I have about myself, other people, and the world? Are they aligned with my purpose? Do they reflect the values I claim to have? What is my true nature, apart from my reputation? What values will I refuse to deny because, to do so, I would violate my ideals and ethics?

No one should think he is too smart or too safe to avoid consequences of a lack of character.

Don't expect your success to carry you in life. Rather, let your success be carried by your character.

People become leaders when they make the decision not to sacrifice their principles on the altar of convenience or compromise.

At the heart of Christian ethic is humility; at the heart of its parodies, pride. Different roads with different destinations, and the destinations color the character of those who travel by them.

Scripture trains us to listen to and learn from stories of all kinds, inside the sacred text and outside, and to discern patterns and meanings within them. Stories of all sorts form and shape the character of those who read them. We live within the narrative as creatures in search of an ending, in search of happiness.

Forget happiness. You were called to a throne. How will you prepare for it? That is the question of virtue, Christian style.

Virtue is what happens when habitual choices have been wise.

The future goal is the thing which produces character in the present.

Successful resistance to temptation may result in an increase of moral muscle, but that is because one is going to need it. A temptation resisted may become more, not less, fierce.

Virtue, in this strict sense, is what happens when someone has made a thousand small choices, requiring effort and concentration, to do something which is good and right but which doesn't "come naturally"—and then, on the thousand and first time, when it really matters, they find that they do what's required "automatically," as we say.

You become like what you worship.