Definition of "deserve"

God exacteth of thee less than thine iniquity deserveth.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], Job 11:6

John Gay deserved to be a favourite.

1853, William Makepeace Thackeray, The English Humorists of the Eighteenth Century

the grantees named in the questioned deed executed by their father richly deserved receiving the family home.

1967, The Pacific Reporter, page 510

Perhaps they do, but they don't deserve that the rest of us contribute money or appropriate public funds for the purchase of pictures and the construction of buildings.

2008, Michael Walzer, Spheres Of Justice: A Defense Of Pluralism And Equality, page 24

That gentle Lady, whom I loue and serue, / After long suit and weary seruicis, / Did aske me, how I could her loue deserue, / And how she might be sure, that I would neuer swerue.

1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie

Gramercy saide the kynge / & I lyue sir Lambegus I shal deserue hit / And thenne sir Lambegus armed hym / and rode after as fast as he myghte(please add an English translation of this quotation)

1485, Sir Thomas Malory, chapter XXX, in Le Morte Darthur, book VIII

Pray you, lead on. At every house I'll call; / I may command at most. Get weapons, ho! / And raise some special officers of night. / On, good Roderigo: I'll deserve your pains.

c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals, and the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals)

A man that hath / So well deserved me.

c. 1619–22, Philip Massinger and John Fletcher, A Very Woman