Moral Meaning
/ˈmɒɹəl/Definition, CEFR level B2, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
adjOf or relating to principles of right and wrong in behaviour, especially for teaching right behaviour.
adjOf or relating to principles of right and wrong in behaviour, especially conforming to principles of rectitude.
Sentence Examples
We will give them moral support.
It is a moral question.
I could see no way of resolving this moral dilemma.
CEFR Practice Quiz
The teacher praised the student's ____ decision to return the lost wallet to its owner.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The story has an important ____ lesson about the value of honesty and the various consequences of being greedy and selfish.
Word Origin & History
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *meh₁-der. Proto-Italic *mōs Latin mōs Proto-Indo-European *h₂el-der.? Proto-Italic *-ālis Latin -ālis Latin mōrālis Old French moralbor. Middle English moral English moral From Middle English moral, from Old French moral, from Latin mōrālis (“relating to manners or morals”) (first used by Cicero, to translate Ancient Greek ἠθικός (ēthikós, “moral”)), from mos (“manner, custom”).
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"She had wandered without rule or guidance in a moral wilderness."
— 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter, a Romance, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, →OCLC:
"The stories did not seem to me to touch life. They were plainly intended to have a bracing moral effect, and perhaps had this result for the people at whom they were aimed. They left me with the impression of a well-delivered stereopticon lecture, with characters about as life-like as the shadows on the screen, and whisking on and off, at the mercy of the operator."
— 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:
""You'd better not collar anything now, because it's a moral that old Antonio would nip out behind one of those cases.""
— 1913, Norman Lindsay, A Curate in Bohemia, Sydney: N.S.W. Bookstall Co., published 1932, page 22:
""One thing," added George, after the peculiarities of the situation had been sufficiently admitted, "it's going to be the last time I'm mixed up in what isn't strictly on the level. If we get clear this once with anything like tidy, old girl, it'll be that little cottage with the pigs and poultry for a moral.""
— 1934, Ernest Bramah, The Bravo of London:
Explore More B2 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
The teacher praised the student's ____ decision to return the lost wallet to its owner.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The story has an important ____ lesson about the value of honesty and the various consequences of being greedy and selfish.