Conscience, in the sense that one's actions or motives are either right or wrong, impelling one towards "right action", of course "exists" in the lives of all men. But it's not "mental"; conscience is part of your temperament. At one end of the spectrum you have men whose conscience is limited to mere self-preservation cum aggrandizement, i.e., right action is: securing "what's in it for me, and screw the hindmost"; at the other end are the Hindu's who brush the ground free of insects as they walk to ensure taking no life, or the Christian whose conscience is the “still, small voice” guidance to “turn the other cheek".
As far as conscience the word/concept is concerned, being part of the "secondary world" it is meaningless for one who's alert. He recognizes it as a necessary concept for the "civilized" (those attuned and identified with the secondary domain--and therefore doing life's work...in fits and starts) but profitless for awakening. For one awake, conscience is seeing and accepting his temperament and acting in accord with it, without guilt or pride. A man at the animal end of the conscience-spectrum is not interested in awakening, yet acts in total accord with his temperament and is therefore living "a life of conscience" at the "basement level" so to speak. At the other end, men’s temperaments are interested in awakening; conscience for these, the more civilized, is based on life's dictated external codes and always involves uncertainty, guilt and/or smug self-righteousness: conscience at "street level".
Gurdjieff's "help lessen the suffering of our common father" equates to Jan Cox’s saying "the neural rebel consciously assists Life's greater growth by reducing or eliminating the inefficiencies (not to say "error") of ordinary mentation". The routine must tediously pick at and squabble over the Gordian Knot of life while the Neural Rebel cleanly cleaves it through with slashing-scimitar-eyes. To complete the analogy: awakened conscience is action at the "helipad" level. To "talk" about, or invoke or espouse a "life of conscience" as opposed to clinically seeing how one acts, is purely an exercise in dreamland--no different than arguing over whether god exists.
To take words/concepts seriously is folly for seeing anything. Conscience is blood 'n guts -based: it exists in and through genetic temperament and not as a result of inculcation or teaching. If you think it does, ask yourself this: how did the inculcator receive his indoctrination? An endless chain of regression--back to...what? The Prime Brainwasher? So, sure, "conscience"--the word--has meaning...for the ordinary, but it is "unacceptable action"-based, and there are no unacceptable actions...except for one with his own code of conduct and responsible only to himself. Everything else is pure distraction. Only to the undistracted is self-conscience possible...
Conscience = Temperament;
Consciousness = Space in/for/of Seeing What-is;
Ordinary mind = "What is ‘What-is’?";
Who = Consciousness;
How = Who.
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