conscience

noun (C, U)

1 MIND the part of your mind that tells you whether what you are doing is morally right or wrong: Be guided by your conscience. | a social conscience (=a moral sense of how society should be) | a guilty/bad conscience (=feel guilty because you have done something wrong): It was his guilty conscience that made him offer to help. | a clear conscience (=a feeling that you have done nothing wrong): Well at least I can face them all with a clear conscience. | a twinge/pang of conscience (=guilty feeling): Ian felt a pang of conscience at having misjudged her. | have no conscience (about sth) (=not feel guilty about something): They've no conscience at all about cheating. | a prisoner of conscience (=someone who is in prison because of their political or religious beliefs) | a matter of conscience (=something that you must make a moral judgment about): I can't tell you what to do - it's a matter of conscience.

2 on your conscience if you have something on your conscience it makes you feel guilty: If anything happens to her I'll always have it on my conscience.

3 prick your conscience if an action or event pricks your conscience, it makes you feel guilty: The dog's sad look pricked her conscience and she took him home.

4 clear your conscience to make yourself stop feeling guilty by telling someone about what you did wrong: Terry decided to clear his conscience and confess.

5 in all conscience formal if you cannot in all conscience do something, you cannot do it because you think it is wrong: I couldn't in all conscience tell him that his job was safe.

6 in good conscience if you do something in good conscience, you do it because you think it is the right thing to do: statements made in good conscience