Definition of "moralize" in English

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:

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.

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.

5. (transitive, obsolete) To apply to a moral purpose; to explain in a moral sense; to draw a moral from.

6. (transitive, obsolete) To supply with moral lessons, teachings, or examples; to lend a moral to.