justify

Verb

1. To provide an acceptable explanation for.
   • How can you justify spending so much money on clothes?
   • Paying too much for car insurance is not justified.
   • What in me is dark Illumine, what is low raise and support; That to the highth of this great Argument I may assert th’ Eternal Providence, And justifie the wayes of God to men. - 1667, John Milton, “Book I”, in Paradise...
2. To be a good reason behind a normally-unacceptable action; to warrant.
   • Nothing can justify your rude behaviour last night.
   • Unless the oppression is so extreme as to justify revolution, it would not justify the evil of breaking up a government, under an abstract constitutional right to do so. - 1861, Edward Everett, The Great Issues Now...
   • Preservation of two railway routes between Belfast and Derry could no longer be justified and one of them must go. - 1956 May, “Transport in Ulster”, in Railway Magazine, page 280:
3. To arrange (text) on a page or a computer screen such that the left and right ends of all lines within paragraphs are aligned.
   • The text will look better justified.
4. To absolve, and declare to be free of blame or sin.
   • I cannot justify whom the law condemns. - 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […]...
   • And by him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses. - 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Acts 13:39:
5. To give reasons for one’s actions; to make an argument to prove that one is in the right.
   • She felt no need to justify herself for deciding not to invite him.
   • And he said unto them, Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God. - 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King...
   • […] I was equally unable to justify myself and unwilling to acknowledge my errors […] - 1848, Anne Brontë, “Chapter 13”, in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall:
6. To prove; to ratify; to confirm.
   • She is not dead at Tarsus, as she should have been, By savage Cleon: she shall tell thee all; When thou shalt kneel, and justify in knowledge She is thy very princess. - c. 1607–1608 (date written), William Shakespeare,...
   • […] say My wife’s a hobby-horse, deserves a name As rank as any flax-wench that puts to Before her troth-plight: say’t and justify’t. - c. 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Winters Tale”, in Mr....
7. To show (a person) to have had a sufficient legal reason for an act that has been made the subject of a charge or accusation.
8. To qualify (oneself) as a surety by taking oath to the ownership of sufficient property.
   • J'USTIFYING BAIL, practice, is the production of bail in court, who there justify' themselves against the exception of the plaintiff. - 1839, John Bouvier, A Law Dictionary Adapted to the Constitution and Laws of the...