Morality is the set of ideas about what is right and wrong. Public morality, a question of morality, the morality of it.
It differs from ethics chiefly in usage: morality tends to mean a shared or personal code, and ethics the systematic study of it, though the two are used interchangeably. A morality tale is a story told to make a moral point. Note moral, both adjective and noun; moralise, which means to lecture people about right and wrong and is never a compliment; and immoral against amoral, which means having no moral sense at all.
1nounmoralityThe set of ideas about what is right and wrong.
“The film raises questions about the morality of killing one person to save many.”
morality is a code of right and wrong.
Latin moralitas comes from mos, a custom or manner — the plural mores means the customs of a people. Cicero coined moralis to translate the Greek ethikos, so morality and ethics are the same word in two languages.
Latin
mōrālitās — manner, characteristic, character
Middle French
moralité
Anglo-Norman
moralité
English, today
morality
Built from
From Anglo-Norman moralité, Middle French moralité, from Latin mōrālitās (“manner, characteristic, character”), from Latin mōrālis (“relating to manners or morals”), from mōs (“manner, custom”). equivalent to moral + ity.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA