You searched for: “expostulate
expostulate (verb), expostulates; expostulated; expostulating
To reason earnestly with someone about his or her conduct or behavior: Mary expostulated with her little brother as she was trying to persuade him not to kick the ball around in the living room!
To earnestly try to reason with someone to correct his or her behavior.
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expostulate, postulate
expostulate (ik SPAHS chuh layt") (verb)
To reason or to discuss earnestly, typically to point out an inappropriate behavior: The parents attempted to expostulate with their children about the broken window.
postulate (PAHS chuh layt") (verb)
To assume that something is true: Jarvis stated he would postulate that the garden would do much better if it rained more often.

It seemed silly to try to expostulate with the small children just because Merlin had decided to postulate that they had stolen apples from his tree.