Let's start by defining "ethos". "Ethos" is a Greek word meaning "character" that is used to describe the guiding beliefs or ideals that characterise a community, nation, or ideology. The Greeks also used this word to refer to the power of music to influence its hearer's emotions, behaviours, and even morals. (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethos) "To imbue" something means to completely soak or saturate it with something else, as in dying a cloth with ink so that it is deeply stained. However, "to imbue" is usually used to convey this idea in conjunction with ideology, as something that inspires, thoroughly influences or pervades something else. When we put these two together, we have these kinds of examples: The school is imbued with the ethos of Catholicism. The company has a bureaucracy imbued with a professional ethos. Samurai were imbued with the ethically grounded ethos of the warrior. Nowadays there is a strong masculinist ethos in new European music.