Conscience

“Conscience” is pronounced something like “konshuns” ( /ˈkɑn·ʃəns/ ). If you would like to hear it pronounced by a speaker of British English, click here.

We use it to mean knowing what is right and wrong.

Many common expressions use the word “conscience”.

People have a guilty conscience when they know they have done something wrong:

• He had a guilty conscience about eating all the cake.
• He has suffered from a guilty conscience ever since he argued with his father.
• She didn’t have a guilty conscience even though everybody else thought she was wrong.

People have a clear conscience when they think they have done nothing wrong:

• I had a clear conscience about what I had done.
• Her conscience was clear.
• I sleep well at night, knowing that I have a clear conscience.

We have pangs of conscience when we are worried that we might have done something wrong:

• I had a sudden pang of conscience that I should have behaved better.
• I tried my best but I sometimes have pangs of conscience that I could have done more to help.

When someone makes us think that we have done something wrong, we say that they pricked our conscience:

• He pricks my conscience every time he talks about my family.
• She pricked my conscience when she reminded me about what I did last year.
• The teacher pricked my conscience when she told me that I wasn’t doing enough studying.

 When someone has no sense of right and wrong or is not bothered by what is right and wrong we say that they have no conscience:

• I don’t know how they sleep at night, they must have no conscience.
• The criminal showed no conscience for his crimes.

If we think that we have done something wrong we might say that we have qualms of conscience:

• I still have qualms of conscience about how I spoke to her.
• I have no qualms of conscience about what I said.

We talk about freedom of conscience when we mean that people have the right to make decisions based on their own feelings of right and wrong:

• The United Nations Declaration of Human Rights says that everyone has the right to freedom of conscience.
• Freedom of conscience means that people have the right to worship as they choose.
• He said that his freedom of conscience meant that he could not fight in the war.

^{Thanks to Ivan for the question}

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Posted by Graham