moralize

Etymology

From Old French moraliser.

verb

1. (intransitive) To make moral reflections (on, upon, about or over something); to regard acts and events as involving a moral.
   1589, Robert Greene, Menaphon, London: Sampson Clarke, “Arcadia,” […] his Ladie reaching him a Marigold, he began to moralize of it thus merely. I meruaile the Poets that were so prodigall in painting the amorous affection of the Sunne to his Hyacinth, did neuer obserue the relation of loue twixt him and the Marigold:
   1741, Samuel Richardson, Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded, London: S. Richardson and J. Osborn,, Volume 3, Letter 8, p. 38, […] I shall not make an unworthy Correspondent altogether; for I can get into thy grave Way, and moralize a little now-and-then:
   The usual conduct of the spoilt child! Had she not witnessed it, and moralized upon it, in other families? 1908, Arnold Bennett, chapter 8, in The Old Wives’ Tale
   I depended on Philip now, for I had nothing, not even seven cents for carfare. I could be certain, however, that he wouldn’t moralize at me, he’d set about dressing me, he’d scrounge a sweater among his neighborhood acquaintances […] 1991, Saul Bellow, “Something to Remember Me By”, in Something to Remember Me By: Three Tales, New York: Viking, page 206
2. (transitive) To say (something) expressing a moral reflection or judgment.
   1929, Virginia Woolf, “Geraldine and Jane” in The Common Reader, Second Series, London: The Hogarth Press, 1935, p. 191, “The more one loves, the more helpless one feels”, she moralised.
3. (transitive) To render moral; to correct the morals of; to give the appearance of morality to.
   Let gratefull Aromatick odours burne, Let pious incense smoake, for the returne Of Great Flaminius, in whom abide More Art, then raised Athens to her pride, More civill Ethicks he containe, then may 1647, Robert Baron, Erotopaignion, or, The Cyprian Academy, London, page 61
   In estimating the value of cotton, its capacity to excite industry among the lower classes of people […] is of high importance. It has had a large share in moralizing the poor white people of the country. 1809, David Ramsay, chapter 11, in The History of South-Carolina: from Its First Settlement in 1670, to the Year 1808, volume 2, Charleston, page 449
   He sees the idiocy of an educational system founded on the Greek lexicon and the wax-ended cane; on the other hand, he has no use for the new kind of school that is coming up in the ’fifties and ’sixties, the “modern” school, with its gritty insistence on “facts”. What, then, does he want? As always, what he appears to want is a moralised version of the existing thing—the old type of school, but with no caning, no bullying or underfeeding, and not quite so much Greek. 1940, George Orwell, “Charles Dickens”, in Sonia Orwell, Ian Angus, editors, The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell, volume 1, New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, published 1968, page 426
   Far more dangerous than crimes of passion are the crimes of idealism—the crimes which are instigated, fostered and moralized by hallowed words. 1952, Aldous Huxley, chapter 11, in The Devils of Loudun, New York: Harper & Row, page 301
4. (transitive) To give a moral quality to; to affect the moral quality of, either for better or worse.
   1716, Thomas Browne, Christian Morals, Part 3, in Religio Medici; its sequel Christian Morals, London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1844, p. 211, For since good and bad stars moralize not our actions, and neither excuse nor commend, acquit or condemn our good or bad deeds at the present or last bar […] not celestial figures, but virtuous schemes must denominate and state our actions.
   The attempts which are made in such [school] courses [on ‘hygiene’] to make as many physiological phenomena as possible point a moral, and to suppress the rest, are reminiscent of the analogous attempts to moralize zoology which were made by the authors of mediaeval bestiaries. 1927, J. B. S. Haldane, “The Time Factor in Medicine”, in Possible Worlds and Other Essays, London: Chatto and Windus, published 1930
   He makes no attempt to moralize his gods or to pass any moral judgement upon them. 1948, Gilbert Murray, Sophocles Oedipus at Colonus: Translated into English rhyming verse with Introduction and Notes, London: George Allen & Unwin, Preface, p. 9
   With the advent of Christianity, which imposed more moralized notions of disease […], a closer fit between disease and “victim” gradually evolved. 1978, Susan Sontag, chapter 6, in Illness as Metaphor, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, page 43
5. (transitive, obsolete) To apply to a moral purpose; to explain in a moral sense; to draw a moral from.
   […] where the Place is obscure, and the Construction difficult, I take leave by paraphrase to give the Meaning: which is a method of times observed by the Septuagint, whose Version Moralizeth in the Greek, what was wrapp’d up in figures by the Hebrew. 1654, Henry King, The Psalmes of David from the New Translation of the Bible Turned into Meter, London: Humphrey Moseley, Preface
   In the Fairy Queen, allegory is wrought upon chivalry, and the feats and figments of Arthur’s round table are moralised. 1781, Thomas Warton, “The History of English Poetry”, in et al., London: J. Dodsley, Volume 3, Section 43, pp. 498-499
6. (transitive, obsolete) To supply with moral lessons, teachings, or examples; to lend a moral to.
   Kind Nature’s charities his steps attend, In every babbling brook he finds a friend, While chast’ning thoughts of sweetest use, bestowed 1793, William Wordsworth, “Pleasures of the Pedestrian”, in Poems by William Wordsworth: including Lyrical Ballads, and the Miscellaneous Pieces of the Author, volume 1, London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, published 1815, page 70