Theodore Roosevelt actually said...

The one indispensable thing for us to keep is a high standard of character for the average American citizen.

it is even a greater thing to be what all of us are—Americans.

I ask of you the straightforward, earnest performance of duty in all the little things that come up day by day in business, in domestic life...

In the last analysis it is the man's own character which is and must ever be the determining factor in his success or failure in life