He is [proud] even to the altitude of his virtue.

Linguists are familiar with the phenomenon, which may be called the euphemism treadmill. People invent new words for emotionally charged referents, but soon the euphemism becomes tainted by association, and a new word must be found, which soon acquires its own connotations, and so on.

Mutt stalked forward, matching him, step for step, crabbing sideways the way wolves do when they're going for the kill.

They broke out of prison in the middle of the night.