ennoble

Framing the Declaration as more than a manifesto establishing a new nation, Coolidge described it as “everywhere to ennoble humanity.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 22, 2026

It’s a conviction that allows us to ennoble ourselves with pathos, with rueful maturity, with wisdom won too late.

From New York Times ● Sep. 6, 2021

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

Ah, generous Elinor! thought Juliet, tears of gratitude glistening in her eyes: what a mixture of contrasting qualities sully, and ennoble your character in turn!

From The Wanderer (Volume 3 of 5) or, Female Difficulties by Burney, Fanny

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

It is also often seen as a form of art that ennobles those who play and listen to it.

From Salon ● Mar. 20, 2021

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

For it must not be presumed that mores necessarily grow worse from knowing the moral sciences, which teach the virtues, indeed, there is not the slightest doubt that moral education amends and ennobles them.

From Textbooks ● Jan. 1, 2019

Alas! they did not know that there are riches which do not enrich, and that it is only the gold that does good that ennobles.

From The Story of Magellan and The Discovery of the Philippines by Butterworth, Hezekiah

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

His balding head’s scraggly hair—in contrast to the wigs worn by just about every Frenchman at the time, no matter the social class—is both ennobling and a bit enfeebling, like an aging but distinguished mane.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 12, 2026

Her stoicism is all the more ennobling, given how much it costs her.

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 19, 2025

It adds an ennobling air to their real function, which is propaganda.

From Salon ● Apr. 20, 2023

In 1650, Diego Velázquez painted this ennobling portrait of Juan de Pareja, a studio assistant enslaved in his studio.

From New York Times ● Apr. 7, 2023

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

From "The Joy Luck Club" by Amy Tan