MORALS

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does morals mean? 

• MORALS (noun)
  The noun MORALS has 1 sense:

1. motivation based on ideas of right and wrong

  Familiarity information: MORALS used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• MORALS (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Motivation based on ideas of right and wrong

Classified under:

Nouns denoting goals

Synonyms:

ethical motive; ethics; morality; morals

Hypernyms ("morals" is a kind of...):

motivation; motive; need (the psychological feature that arouses an organism to action toward a desired goal; the reason for the action; that which gives purpose and direction to behavior)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "morals"):

hedonism (the pursuit of pleasure as a matter of ethical principle)

conscience; moral sense; scruples; sense of right and wrong (motivation deriving logically from ethical or moral principles that govern a person's thoughts and actions)

Christ Within; Inner Light; Light; Light Within (a divine presence believed by Quakers to enlighten and guide the soul)

 Context examples 

Their conversations, however, were not always on subjects so high as history or morals.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

You are a man utterly without what the world calls morals?

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

She sent this didactic gem to several markets, but it found no purchaser, and she was inclined to agree with Mr. Dashwood that morals didn't sell.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

“A woman, sir, has her love to bestow,” said my uncle. “A man has his snuff-box. Neither is to be lightly offered. It is a lapse of taste; nay, more, it is a breach of morals.”

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

In choosing persons for all employments, they have more regard to good morals than to great abilities; for, since government is necessary to mankind, they believe, that the common size of human understanding is fitted to some station or other; and that Providence never intended to make the management of public affairs a mystery to be comprehended only by a few persons of sublime genius, of which there seldom are three born in an age: but they suppose truth, justice, temperance, and the like, to be in every man’s power; the practice of which virtues, assisted by experience and a good intention, would qualify any man for the service of his country, except where a course of study is required.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

Mrs. Rushworth had gone, for the Easter holidays, to Twickenham, with a family whom she had just grown intimate with: a family of lively, agreeable manners, and probably of morals and discretion to suit, for to their house Mr. Crawford had constant access at all times.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

Mr. Davis knew any quantity of Greek, Latin, algebra, and ologies of all sorts so he was called a fine teacher, and manners, morals, feelings, and examples were not considered of any particular importance.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

But I cannot call that situation nothing which has the charge of all that is of the first importance to mankind, individually or collectively considered, temporally and eternally, which has the guardianship of religion and morals, and consequently of the manners which result from their influence.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)