ennoble

The author makes clear that suffering, despite popular mythology, typically does not ennoble.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 29, 2026

To ennoble what could seem a shallow, idiosyncratic gesture, I call this campaign the post-nominal revolution, hoping for a future when you will never have to use anyone’s name, ever.

From New York Times ● May 30, 2019

The number of people who, out of civic generosity, think that they can enlarge or ennoble their selves by giving their energies to a good larger than themselves?

From Salon ● May 27, 2019

The Greek terms ennoble the ailments, even if they don’t make them go away.

From The New Yorker ● Jan. 7, 2019

At one and twenty she was a beautiful woman, with that nameless air of distinction which can ennoble the plainest face and figure.

From Diana Tempest, Volume I (of 3) by Mary Cholmondeley

It’s a great, and possibly fictitious, myth that ennobles an ethos of isolated bravery.

From Slate ● Mar. 26, 2024

Nothing can quite convey the devastation of those who knew and loved “the fallen,” a euphemism that ennobles their sacrifice but also fails to capture the awfulness of violent death.

From Washington Post ● May 29, 2022

Yet in accordance with James Baldwin's dictum that suffering ennobles nobody, we must recognize that pragmatism, more than empathy, powered their relationship.

From Salon ● Feb. 6, 2022

We’d like to believe that suffering instructs and ennobles; that our grief, fear and pain increases our sympathy for the grief, fear and pain of others.

From The Guardian ● Oct. 6, 2020

We hope—for the sake of Hungary, for the sake of Liberty, and for the sake of all that ennobles manhood—that it may not!

From Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol IV. No. XX. January, 1852. by Various

Better to live in a world where freedom of expression is ubiquitous than one where the “truth” is told to us by a few ennobled journalists.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 13, 2026

Lord Houchen is the Conservative mayor for Tees Valley, which includes Stockton, and was ennobled in Boris Johnson's resignation honours list.

From BBC ● Nov. 23, 2023

And that is the thing about generative AI and language learning models: They exist only by feeding on the ennobled human soul.

From Salon ● Aug. 29, 2023

And they’re very different from the ennobled peasants in popular genre paintings by artists like the Le Nain brothers in France or cheery laborers by Dutch artist Johannes Lingelbach.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 31, 2023

These opportunities, therefore, made these men successful, and their outstanding virtue enabled them to recognize that opportunity, whereby their nation was ennobled and became extremely happy.

From "The Prince" by Niccolò Machiavelli

Patriotism was ennobling, self-sacrifice was reflexive; heroism was rewarded, and everybody was proudly in this fight together.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 7, 2025

Shostakovich’s detractors have accused him of ennobling Stalin while defenders have sought out subtle musical cues of dissent.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 1, 2024

Philanthropy, the ennobling pursuit of the rich and famous, is in the headlines.

From BBC ● Nov. 27, 2022

“Theater isn’t supposed to be accusing anyone. It’s supposed to be supporting and maybe ennobling them in some way.”

From New York Times ● Nov. 12, 2021

And this confession made his romantic gestures all the more ennobling.

From "The Joy Luck Club" by Amy Tan