Quotes about Character

As iron cast into fire loses its rust and becomes glowing white, so he who turns completely to God is stripped of his sluggishness and changed into a new man. When a man begins to grow lax, he fears a little toil and welcomes external comfort, but when he begins perfectly to conquer himself and to walk bravely in the ways of God, then he thinks those things less difficult which he thought so hard before.

Occasions of adversity best discover how great virtue or strength each one hath. For occasions do not make a man frail, but they reveal what he is.

The man who is not yet wholly dead to self, is soon tempted, and is overcome in small and trifling matters.

On the day of judgment, surely, we shall not be asked what we have read but what we have done; not how well we have spoken but how well we have lived.

Of a surety, at the Day of Judgment it will be demanded of us, not what we have read, but what we have done; not how well we have spoken, but how holily we have lived.

Peace is ever with the humble man, but in the heart of the proud there is envy and continual wrath.

The beginning of all temptations to evil is instability of temper and want of trust in God;

What doth it profit thee to enter into deep discussion concerning the Holy Trinity, if thou lack humility, and be thus displeasing to the Trinity? For verily it is not deep words that make a man holy and upright;

Who is forced to struggle more than he who tries to master himself? This ought to be our purpose, then: to conquer self, to become stronger each day, to advance in virtue.

To think of oneself as nothing, and always to think well and highly of others is the best and most perfect wisdom.

He who shaneth not small faults falleth little by little into greater.

Moreover, virtue is not concerned with the amount of pleasure experienced by the external sense, as this depends on the disposition of the body; what matters is how much the interior appetite is affected by that pleasure.