ISTJ

Arthur Wellington

'The Duke of Wellington' - U.K. Prime Minister and general

Wellington: "Whatever enthusiasm [an army feels is] the result of the example set [by] the head of the army."

Wellington: "The word of an English officer is a sure guarantee."

[Explaining why he broke with Britain's Spanish allies:]
Wellington: "They are really children. ... I cannot say that they do anything as it ought to be done."

[Responding to accusations against him:]
Wellington: "I [trust that the issue] will not be made the subject of that vague and general sort of discussion which sometimes takes place ... but that every fact will be fully and fairly sifted."

Jules Maurel: "Wellington always spoke with reserve."

ISTJ

George Washington

U.S. President and general

Washington: "Happiness and moral duty are inseparably connected."

Washington: "Labor to keep alive in your breast that little spark of celestial fire called conscience."

[Admonishing his unpaid soldiers not to rise up against Congress:]
Washington: "You will not do it. You will give one more distinguished proof of patriotism and patient virtue, rising superior to suffering."

Kelley L. Ross: "[Washington] was resolute and brave in action, moderate and restrained in his judgment, yet ... ferocious in his rare anger."

Richard Brookhiser: "[Washington had won] a war for independence and then gone home. [He embodied] the legend of the Roman who returned to his plow after saving his country."

ISTJ

Dwight D. Eisenhower

U.S. President (R) and general

[On leading the U.S. Army during WW2:]
Eisenhower: "This is a long tough road we have to travel. ... Fake reputations, habits of glib, clever speech, and glittering surface performance are going to be discovered."

Eisenhower: "[Children should contribute] to a family's essential survival and happiness. [In] an urban society, children are ... robbed of the opportunity to do genuinely responsible work."

David M. Oshinsky: "Eisenhower could get diverse factions to work toward a common goal. ... Leadership, he explained, meant patience."

Steven J. Rubenzer: "Eisenhower is the only modern president much like Washington."

ISTJ

Stonewall Jackson

U.S. Civil War general

Jackson: "It is important that those at headquarters set an example by remaining [on] duty. If all our troops, officers, and men were [constantly] at their posts, we might ... expect a more speedy termination of the war."

Jackson: "It is not desirable to have a large number of intimate friends. You may have many acquaintances, but few intimate friends."

Jackson: "I like liquor - its taste and its effects - and that is just the reason why I never drink it."

Jackson: "I am obliged to sweat [my men] tonight, so that I may save their blood tomorrow."

Jackson: "Let your conduct have uniformity: Temperance, silence and order."

ISTJ

Warren Buffett

Super-investor and author

Buffett: "There is no formula to figure [value] out. You have to know the business [and the company] has to be run by honest and able people."

Buffett: "[When investing on the stock exchange] what you need is the temperament to control the urges that get other people into trouble."

Buffett: "I've reluctantly discarded the notion of my continuing to manage [my stock] portfolio after my death - abandoning my hope to give new meaning to the term 'thinking outside the box.'"

Bill Gates: "Warren's framework has been [consistent for 40 years] he has always looked at the world in terms of integrity."

ISTJ

Jeff Bezos

Founder of Amazon

Bezos: "A company shouldn't get addicted to being shiny, because shiny doesn't last."

Bezos: "We are an appropriate company only for long-term-oriented investors."

Bezos: "As Warren Buffett says [if you take] a long-term approach ... you get the shareholders you deserve."

Bezos: "I'd rather interview 50 people and not hire anyone than hire the wrong person."

Alan Deutschman: "[He wants to] base all decisions on data, not ... instinct."

Robert Hof: "He often plunges into minute details himself."

ISTJ

Ingvar Kamprad

Founder of IKEA

Kamprad: "Be thankful to those who are the pillars of our society! Those simple, quiet, taken-for-granted people who ... do their duty and shoulder their responsibility without being noticed."

Kamprad: "The aim [of IKEA] is to reach a good result in the long term."

[Asked about his extreme frugality:]
Kamprad: "If I start to acquire luxurious things then this will only incite others to follow suit. It's important that leaders set an example."

The Age Magazine: "IKEA's [morals extend] to the customer. Whether you like it or not, [they] teach you the value of good, honest, simple, hard work. Self-assembly ... is more than a cost-cutting measure: [To them] it's a tool ... to make you sweat for your own edification."

ISTJ

Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Campaigner against Islam and writer, married to Niall Ferguson

Ali: "I judge. I would like us to judge. I would like us to say: One religion is better than the other. One culture is better than the other. One idea is better than the other."

Ali: "I confront the [intellectual] elite's self-image as tolerant while [right] under their noses women are living like slaves."

Ali: "I feel this obligation. ... I think that I can't just lie around ... and enjoy a life of Western progress and at the same time keep quiet about what is not right."

Ali: "Judged by our standards, Muhammad is a pervert."

Ali: "Christopher Hitchens was a dear friend [of mine] and a man who lived for the mind."

ISTJ

Thomas Hobbes

Philosopher

Hobbes: "During times where men live without a great power to keep them all in awe, they are in a war of every man, against every man."

Hobbes: "By how much one man has more experience of things past, than another, by so much also he is more prudent, and his expectations the seldomer fail him."

Hobbes: "He that has most experience [is] so much more prudent than he that is new, as not to be equalled by any advantage of natural and extemporary wit: though many young men think the contrary."

ISTJ

Sigmund Freud

Psychoanalyst, mentor of Jung and Adler

Freud: "My love is something valuable to me which I ought not to throw away without reflection. ... If I love someone, they must deserve it."

C.G. Jung: "I came to Freud for facts. I read 'The Interpretation of Dreams' and I thought: 'Oh, here is a man who is not just theorizing away, here is a man who has got facts.'"

J.H. van der Hoop: "[Compared to Jung] Freud's standpoint seems to me to be more cautious and more thorough."

Albert Einstein: "[Freud's] sense of reality is less clouded by wishful thinking than is the case with other people and [he combines] the qualities of critical judgment, earnestness and responsibility."

ISTJ

Joseph Ratzinger

Pope

Ratzinger: "[I am not] one of those thoughtless people who always uncritically accept what is new as necessarily better."

Ratzinger: "Belief [is] the risky enterprise of accepting what cannot be seen as the truly real."

Ratzinger: "Belief [demands that we] accept [what is] eternally valid. And that [is not fashionable] in an age when the idea of 'tradition' has been replaced by the idea of 'progress.'"

Ratzinger: "The church needs to withstand the tides of trends and the latest novelties."

ISTJ

Xenophon

Greek historian and soldier, student of Socrates

Xenophon: "For the good man, there is nothing better than owning an estate and tending to it, properly."

Xenophon: "To neglect a detail ... is surely to neglect oneself; since in the hour of danger, one's life will depend on it."

Xenophon: "Whatever you determine to be the right thing to do, endeavor to perform it with diligence."

Robin Waterfield: "[To Xenophon] self-discipline is important not just for itself, but because it enables a person not to be distracted by his appetites from doing his duty."

Robin Waterfield: "He is a quiet thinker; he doesn't trumpet his views, but a great deal of careful thought underpins his work."

ISTJ

Richard Nixon

U.S. President (R)

Nixon: "I never say something I cannot do. And I always will do more than I can say."

Nixon: "To me, the most unhappy people in the world are the people ... in Palm Beach: Going to parties every night. Playing golf every afternoon, then bridge. [They have] no purpose."

[When asked what he thought of intellectuals:]
Nixon: "Basically, they have no morals."

[Watching Ford, Carter and Nixon next to each other:]
Bob Dole: "There they are: See no Evil, Hear no Evil and... Evil."

John F. Kennedy: "Nixon is not an extrovert."

ISTJ

Hillary Clinton

U.S. Secretary of State (D), married to Bill Clinton

Clinton: "I've always believed that people should be judged on the basis of actions ... and not just what they ... claim to stand for."

Clinton: "I am someone who hopes for the best and prepares for the worst."

Clinton: "[We should] solve problems one by one [by] hard work, patience, and persistence, and [that] will then aggregate to the [grand] solutions."

Clinton: "Frankly, I see a lot of little girls dressed in ways I think are not very appropriate. It's too much too soon. ... Parents have to draw the line."

Financial Times: "One of her officials calls her an 'information carnivore.'"

ISTJ

Angela Merkel

Chancellor of Germany

Merkel: "I am courageous at the decisive moment. But I need a good deal of start-up time, and I try to take as much as possible into consideration beforehand."

Time Magazine: "She has won [praise] not by [friendliness] but by a quiet, no-frills stress on competence."

Daily Mail: "She is always better informed than anyone else."

Lothar de Maiziere: "She [is] so precise, with ... an eye for detail."

Newsweek: "She [has a] sober approach: If in doubt, stick to the rules."

ISTJ

Karl Doenitz

Grand Admiral to Nazi Germany

Doenitz: "I was fascinated by the [operation] of a U-boat ... where every single man was an indispensable part of the whole. Every submariner, I am sure, has experienced in his heart [the joy of] the task entrusted to him [and] felt as rich as a king."

Doenitz: "Only ... from personal experience [can a man] take the necessary measures without a preliminary process of trial and error."

[On accepting the role as Hitler's successor:]
Doenitz: "I realized ... that my name would remain forever associated with the act and that [the hateful] distortion of facts would ... besmirch my honor. But duty demanded that I pay no attention to any such considerations."

The Guardian: "He possesses an effortless mastery of detail."

ISTJ

Robert de Niro

Actor

De Niro: "You don't just play a part. You've got to earn the right to play it."

De Niro: "As a kid I didn't root for the bad guys. I certainly know the difference between right and wrong."

Matt Damon: "He's famous for being obsessive about details."

ISTJ

Sean Connery

Actor

Connery: "[James Bond's qualities of] self-containment, his powers of decision, his ability to carry on through till the end and to survive ... I like to think I acquired them before Bond."

Connery: "Ever since the introduction of psychoanalysis there have been too many terms to excuse behavior and phrases that can be [used] to explain everything."

Tom Clancy: "[Sean] Connery was a most agreeable gentleman. ... I was most impressed with him. Good guy." [Upon meeting Connery in 1989.]

ISTJ

Natalie Portman

Actress

Portman: "I'd rather be smart than a movie star."

Portman: "I always liked school."

Portman: "[As a child actor] I was good at working with adults."

ISTJ

Danica McKellar

Actress and author of math textbooks aimed at girls

McKellar: "I want to give girls a positive role model when it comes to being smart."

McKellar: "Almost every single section [in my books] has a real-life application. ... [I'm] putting girls in situations that they might actually experience in their lives."

ISTJ

Elizabeth II

Queen of England, mother of Prince Charles

Elizabeth: "There is nothing quite like the family gathering in familiar surroundings [and] in the traditional atmosphere of love and happiness that springs from the enjoyment of simple well-tried things."

Elizabeth: "Many grave problems and difficulties confront us all, but with a new faith in the old ... beliefs given us by our forefathers ... I know we shall be worthy of our duty."

Christopher Hitchens: "I will [grudgingly] admit that the present queen of England is a person of ... integrity."

ISTJ

Maersk McKinney-Moeller

Shipping magnate, CEO of Maersk

McKinney-Moeller: "Exercise constant care. ... It's much easier if you do it right the first time instead of having to correct it later on."

McKinney-Moeller: "People can trust us [at Maersk]. ... A word should be a bond."

Jarl Cordua: "If an employee went even slightly off the rails, or got cocky, he would be shown the door. ... Maersk kept a sharp lookout for charlatans and soldiers of fortune [and] had zero tolerance for them."

ISTJ

Carly Fiorina

CEO of Hewlett-Packard

Fiorina: "[In business] I demonstrated my value through actions rather than words."

Fiorina: "I decided early on that [I would] please my parents. ... To please them, I was obedient, diligent, cheerful and reliable."

Fiorina: "To my siblings, I was probably an insufferable goody two-shoes most of the time."

[On learning to play the piano:]
Fiorina: "I soon found that ... I enjoyed the rigor and the attention to detail that was required."

ISTJ

Brian Dunning

Skeptic podcaster

Dunning: "[My project is] fighting the good fight against the overwhelming majority of noise in the media [and] the erosion of science education in the classroom."

Dunning: "Personal testimonies don't meet the qualifications for scientific evidence and thus won't often be accepted by a responsible skeptic."

Dunning: "If you knew me personally, you would probably find me to be a generally upstanding person."

ISTJ

Pausanias of Athens

Greek moralist, boyfriend of Agathon

Pausanias: "Nothing that is done decently and lawfully can justly be derided."

Pausanias: "There should be a law that forces irresponsible lovers to follow the same constraints that responsible lovers gladly lay upon themselves."

Pausanias: "A man who loves beauty is not constant because he loves something that is not constant. As soon as the bloom of youth fades, he flies away and is gone, bringing disgrace on all he said and promised. But the man who loves goodness of character is constant throughout his life."