a. [UN-1 7.] Not conscientious; not scrupulous or careful: a. Of actions, etc.
[1775. Ash.]
1791. Boswell, Johnson (1831), III. 183. Johnson was shocked at this unconscientious conduct.
1803. Mackintosh, Def. Peltier, Wks. 1846, III. 246. An immoderate and unconscientious exercise of power.
1818. Scott, Rob Roy, xvii. This base and unconscientious scheme of plundering his benefactor.
1884. Law Times, 11 Oct., 382. The Act supposes that the real owner is actuated by unconscientious motives.
b. Of persons.
1827. Scott, Napoleon, v. This unconscientious tribunal found the prisoner guilty. Ibid. (1827), Surg. Dau., xii. An able and active, but unconscientious man.
1884. H. Spencer, in Pop. Sci. Monthly, XXIV. 732. Representatives are unconscientious enough to vote for bills [etc.].
Hence Unconscientiousness.
1860. Froude, Hist. Eng., V. 256. The Earl of Warwick himself was untroubled with religious convictions of any kind, and might take either side with equal unconscientiousness.
1879. Spencer, Data Ethics, xii. 210. Not in large ways only … does each suffer from the general unconscientiousness.
