A gentleman would be ashamed should his deeds not match his words.

Our character is basically a composite of our habits. Because they are consistent, often unconcious patterns, they constantly, daily, express our character.

It is not fair to ask of others what you are not willing to do yourself.

If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it.

Honor and shame from no condition rise. Act well your part: there all the honor lies.

When ideas fail, words come in very handy.

I never gave anybody hell! I just told the truth and they thought it was hell.

We object not to the narration of the deeds of our unregenerate condition, but to the mode in which it is too often done. Let sin have its monument, but let it be a heap of stones cast by the hands of execration – not a mausoleum erected by the hands of affection.

A gentleman is never rude except on purpose – I can honestly be nasty sober, believe you me.

A tramp, a gentleman, a poet, a dreamer, a lonely fellow, always hopeful of romance and adventure.

I think what’s important is for us to decipher what is honest and what is dishonest and be accepting of those things and not operating from fear.

No one can lie, no one can hide anything, when he looks directly into someone’s eyes.

Every time I say something that’s extremely truthful out loud, it literally breaks the Internet.

I exaggerate when I’m angry, but I’ve never gone around telling people things that aren’t true about me.

Quacks are a part of our culture, and we all fall prey to them. Who among us can say, for sure, that even our own personal physicians are honest and competent?

No one ever doubts that I mean what I say. The problem is I sometimes say all that I mean.

Knowledge will give you power, but character respect.

I think everyone should approach relationships from the perspective of playing it straight and giving someone the benefit of the doubt. Until he establishes that this is a game. And if it’s a game, you need to win. The best thing to do is just walk away from the table.

If you feel that there’s the author and then the character, then the book is not working. People have a habit of identifying the author with the narrator, and you can’t, obviously, be all of the narrators in all of your books, or else you’d be a very strange person indeed.

For as one star another far exceeds, So souls in heaven are placed by their deeds.

All cruel people describe themselves as paragons of frankness.

Leadership to me means duty, honor, country. It means character, and it means listening from time to time.

I am who I am and I say what I think. I’m not putting a face on for the record.

Stand with anybody that stands right, stand with him while he is right and part with him when he goes wrong.

The honest poor can sometimes forget poverty. The honest rich can never forget it.

Where there is righteousness in the heart, there is beauty in the character. When there is beauty in the character, there is harmony in the home. When there is harmony in the home, there is order in the nation. When there is order in the nation, there is peace in the world.

Character is like a tree and reputation like a shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.

Talking isn’t doing. It is a kind of good deed to say well; and yet words are not deeds.

The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.

I will never say something I don’t agree with or believe in… even if the reward is massive!

The truth is, hardly any of us have ethical energy enough for more than one really inflexible point of honor.

A man’s character is his guardian divinity.

Music fills in for words a lot of the time when people don’t know what to say, and I think music can be more eloquent than words.

Character is expressed through our behavior patterns, or natural responses to things.

True nobility is exempt from fear.

Let me define a leader. He must have vision and passion and not be afraid of any problem. Instead, he should know how to defeat it. Most importantly, he must work with integrity.

Silence is more eloquent than words.

Character, not circumstances, makes the man.

The precepts of the law are these: to live honestly, to injure no one, and to give everyone else his due.

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

Imagine for yourself a character, a model personality, whose example you determine to follow, in private as well as in public.

I love Notting Hill and Westbourne Grove – there is so much life and vitality around Portobello and Ladbroke Grove. It has come up a lot since I started Virgin more than 40 years ago, but there is so much character.

How can sincerity be a condition of friendship? A taste for truth at any cost is a passion which spares nothing.

Tell the truth, but tell it slant.

Truth is the most valuable thing we have. Let us economize it.

Why lie? I’m not going to be a hypocrite and say the opposite of what I think, like some others do.

The surest way to remain poor is to be an honest man.

Selling out is doing something you don’t really want to do for money. That’s what selling out is.

He who is not a good servant will not be a good master.

It is more from carelessness about truth than from intentionally lying that there is so much falsehood in the world.

Reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.

I hope I shall possess firmness and virtue enough to maintain what I consider the most enviable of all titles, the character of an honest man.

Children say that people are hung sometimes for speaking the truth.

Men show their character in nothing more clearly than what they think laughable.

A good name is rather to be chosen than riches.

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.

I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours.

If every choice you make comes from an honest place, you’re solid, and nothing anybody can say about you can rock you or change your opinion.

The truth of it is that every singer out there with songs on the radio is raising the next generation, so make your words count.

People with courage and character always seem sinister to the rest.

All of us knows, not what is expedient, not what is going to make us popular, not what the policy is, or the company policy – but in truth each of us knows what is the right thing to do. And that’s how I am guided.