"Free will" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... well—'tis well—thus chosen abbot of your own free will, not by my seeking, as ye all can witness; for this, and greater favours past, I'm bound forever to obey, and serve ye! Today, I'll welcome these, our sacred rites; tomorrow, far more awful ceremony! I will descend to the mysterious knights, and prove to those, who vest me with authority, no selfish ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 6, June 1810 • Various
... hastened from the cabinet, foreseeing a scene at which he was unwilling to be present, but which sometimes occurred when James roused himself so far as to exert his own free will, of which he boasted so much, in spite of that of his imperious favourite Steenie, as he called the Duke of Buckingham, from a supposed resemblance betwixt his very handsome countenance, and that with which the Italian artists ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... that all the Boers who attended these meetings did so of their own free will; on the contrary, a very large number came under compulsion, since they found that the English authorities were powerless to give them protection. The recalcitrants were threatened with all sorts of pains and penalties if they did ...
— Cetywayo and his White Neighbours - Remarks on Recent Events in Zululand, Natal, and the Transvaal • H. Rider Haggard
... your own free will, without advice or bias, that you refused the interview I asked you to ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... the darkness now, but of something nearer—something so real and deadly that the old spectres became almost comic, like ghosts made up of dust-sheets and broom-handles. Supposing Christine went still further from him—supposing she left him altogether alone? She wouldn't do it of her free will, but there were things people couldn't help. People died. The thought was a cruel hand twining itself into the strings of his heart. He tried to see her face. Was she young? He didn't know. He had never thought about it. She had been grown-up. That covered everything. Now in the pale, unreal light ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... the reference to her father's troubles, though meant partly in kindness, angered her. It caused her to feel the meshes of the net drawing closer about her, and binding her free will. The fight was indeed on. More than ever she determined to struggle to the bitter end. Almost indefinably she knew that to accept this money, plausible as the offering was, meant ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser
... you don't know!" Then she related the story of the liberated canary bird. "Hetty understands. The cage door is open. She may return when she chooses, but—don't you see?—she must come of her own free will." ...
— The Hollow of Her Hand • George Barr McCutcheon
... the new In fixed order, and primordial seeds Produce not by their swerving some new start Of motion to sunder the covenants of fate, That cause succeed not cause from everlasting, Whence this free will for creatures o'er the lands, Whence is it wrested from the fates,—this will Whereby we step right forward where desire Leads each man on, whereby the same we swerve In motions, not as at some fixed time, Nor at some fixed line of space, but where ...
— Of The Nature of Things • [Titus Lucretius Carus] Lucretius
... that, whenever they wish to defend themselves, they may do so. Beyond any doubt, on the day that tribute is demanded from them, not only our new friends, but Danganlibor and Lumaquan as well, who rendered homage of their own free will, will rebel. For the speedy subjection of them all, we need a large force. Hence I repeat to your Lordship, in order that you may not be deceived by certain opinions of persons who have not seen this region for many years—for it is not as of yore, and they did ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume IX, 1593-1597 • E. H. Blair
... demands of work in guiding ourselves and others thus come to lead us also into practical ethics, with a new conception of the relation of actual and experimental determinism and of what "free will" we may want to speak of, with a new emphasis on the meaning of choice, of effort, and of new creation out of new possibilities presented by the ever-newly-created opportunities of ever-new time. We get a right ...
— A Psychiatric Milestone - Bloomingdale Hospital Centenary, 1821-1921 • Various
... of young animals sucking, yet the more complex instincts seem to have originated independently of intelligence. I am, however, very far from wishing to deny that instinctive actions may lose their fixed and untaught character, and be replaced by others performed by the aid of the free will. On the other hand, some intelligent actions, after being performed during several generations, become converted into instincts and are inherited, as when birds on oceanic islands learn to avoid man. These actions may then be said to be ...
— The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex • Charles Darwin
... place: We have seen that it was not of his own free will, but, on the contrary, very reluctantly, that the monk attended the wounded man who had been recommended to him in so strange a manner. Perhaps he would have sought to escape by flight had he seen any possibility of doing so. He was restrained ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... advised her to go. It was an awful thing for me to tell her she must do her work, but a small thing for her to run away. Well, I hope she likes it. If she thinks I'm going to hitch up a buggy and go chasing around the neighbourhood, begging her to come back, she's mistaken. She's gone of her own free will, and she can come back of the same, ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... thus to the old illusion. All the time of her imprisonment, though now and then in a fit of anger she could hurl bitter names at her son, yet, when calm, she had usually maintained that he was kept away from her, and refused to be convinced that his absence was of his own free will. The longer the illusion lasted, the ...
— The White Lady of Hazelwood - A Tale of the Fourteenth Century • Emily Sarah Holt
... like school, and, being under the care of relatives who allowed him much freedom, he missed a considerable part of the early school training that most boys receive. Yet his time was not wasted, for there were good books in his home, and these he read of his own free will. ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... Either the house in New York, or in Newport, or on Long Island must be made over to me. And I positively refuse to part with the ruby necklace to one of my daughters unless I should choose to do so of my own free will. For the other jewels I have no use whatever. You can express that as you see fit. Ask him to let me hear as soon ...
— The Smart Set - Correspondence & Conversations • Clyde Fitch
... very likely have other sets of a quite different kind, that, for example, a mechanically determined system may also be teleologically or volitionally determined. Finally we considered the problem of free will: here we found that the reasons for supposing volitions to be determined are strong but not conclusive, and we decided that even if volitions are mechanically determined, that is no reason for denying freedom ...
— Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays • Bertrand Russell
... therefore thought it just that the keys of the gates should be restored to them. That their honour formed the strongest tie upon good allies, and that the people and senate of Rome would entertain feelings of gratitude towards them if they continued in friendship with them of their own free will, and not by compulsion." The Roman replied, that "he was placed there by his general to protect the place; that from him he had received the keys of the gates and the custody of the citadel, trusts which he held not subject ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... is long to pledge, and longer to redeem," said Ebbe. "I know that, were I to wait a twelvemonth, you would not of free will give ...
— The White Wolf and Other Fireside Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... mine is aboard here; but fear not, she has come and will come to no harm from me, or from any man while I live. If for no other reason, I do not desire to affront one who, I hope, will be my wife by her own free will, and whom I have brought to Spain that she might not make this impossible by becoming yours. Senor, believe me, I would no more force a woman's will than I would do murder on ...
— Fair Margaret • H. Rider Haggard
... religious truths which reason proclaims, nor prevent either his coming out of his philosophical struggle a firm believer in all the dogmas which are imperiously upheld to the human reason, or his proclaiming his belief in one God and Creator, in our free will, and in the immortality of ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli
... meet you," he said, this time without extending his hand. "I beg to impress upon both you and Mr. Robinson that, such as I am, Dorothy chose me of her own free will to occupy my ...
— A Husband by Proxy • Jack Steele
... insults of the crowd, who, always in extremes, whether of enthusiasm or hatred, would have liked to tear them to pieces, and would not be quieted till they had exacted a promise that the prisoners should be forcibly compelled to make the trial of fire which they had refused to make of their own free will. ...
— The Borgias - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... you kindly. [Courageously] Yes, I'm married. [He looks at DAVID and ALICK to see if they are smiling; and they are.] It wasn't a case of being catched; it was entirely of my own free will. [He looks again; and the mean fellows are smiling still.] ...
— What Every Woman Knows • James M. Barrie
... no more or word or sign from me. Free, upright, and sane is thine own free will, and it would be wrong not to act according to its pleasure; wherefore thee over ...
— The Approach to Philosophy • Ralph Barton Perry
... kettle half mended, the broker left a bargain unclinched, the Scheveningen fisherman in his wooden shoes forgot the cracks in his pinkie, while each paused to hold high converse with friend or foe on fate, free will, or absolute foreknowledge; losing himself in wandering mazes whence there was no issue. Province against province, city against city, family against family; it was one vast scene of bickering, denunciation, heart-burnings, mutual ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... to my Husband to clear myself. I said briefly, I woulde; and I mean to do soe, onlie not to-daye. Oh, sweet countrie Life! I was made for you and none other. This riding and walking at one's owne free Will, in the fresh pure Ayre, coming in to earlie, heartie, wholesome Meals, seasoned with harmlesse Jests,—seeing fresh Faces everie Daye come to the House, knowing everie Face one meets out of Doores,—supping in the Garden, and remaining in the ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning
... constant warfare—Indian warfare, as every one is crouched, concealed, watching for an opportunity to scalp the reputation of his neighbour! They exist in fear and trembling, afraid to speak, afraid to act, or follow their own will, for in America there is no free will. When I have asked why they do not this or that, the reply has invariably been, that they dare not. In fact, to keep their station in society, they must be slaves—not merely slaves, for we are all so far slaves, that if we do that which is not right, ...
— Diary in America, Series Two • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... unequal struggle, the true ring of legendary heroism; it seems an echo of the tale of David and Goliath, or of Jack the Giant Killer; it is full of the triumph of the spirit over the flesh, of independence and free will over fatalism and brute force, ...
— Through the Iron Bars • Emile Cammaerts
... drop," said I. But I, too, thought it queer, considering Corkran's character, and the fact that having resigned of his own free will, he could hardly expect Lark to pay his way home. It even occurred to me to wonder if the resignation were not a sudden thought of the Colonel's. He had spoken several times of going on to Palestine, and had mentioned the trip that morning. Had Sir Marcus said ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... from me when I came in contact with the Cleavers and their friends. Their views never commended themselves to me wholly; but at least they were spiritual and not material. And election is a fact, although they express it oddly—and so is reprobation—and so is what they say of free will, and so is conversion. It is true that we bring natures into the world which are moulded by circumstances and by their own tendencies, as clay in the hands of the potter. Look round you and see that some are made for honour and some for dishonour. So far I agree with the ...
— The Life of Froude • Herbert Paul
... the Rakshasas, with joined hands, repeatedly said unto those ascetics filled with compassion, these words, 'All of us are hungry! We have swerved from eternal virtue! That we are sinful in behaviour is not of our free will! Through the absence of your grace and through our own evil acts, as also through the sexual sins of our women, our demerits increase and we have become Brahma-Rakshasas! So amongst Vaisyas and Sudras, and Kshatriyas, those that hate and injure Brahmanas ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... model goddess, that is, those which make not quite a model woman. Had it been possible for the earth and mankind to be entirely in her grasp for a while, had she handled the distaff, the spindle, and the shears at her own free will, few in the world would have noticed the change of government. There would have been the same inequality of lot, the same heaping up of favours here, of contumely there, the same generosity before justice, the same perpetual dilemmas, the same captious ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... the Egyptian yoke. Accordingly, no sooner did the Phoenicians of the mainland conclude the arrangement by which they became part and parcel of the Persian Empire than the Cyprians followed their example, and, revolting from Egypt, offered themselves of their own free will to Persia.[14260] Cambyses, it is needless to say, readily accepted ...
— History of Phoenicia • George Rawlinson
... I am? I may be as good as a journeyman for all that. If I wasn't, it is hardly likely Master Piemont would have made me so generous an offer, and of his own free will." ...
— Under the Liberty Tree - A Story of The 'Boston Massacre' • James Otis
... volition, conation^, velleity; liberum arbitrium [Lat.]; will and pleasure, free will; freedom &c 748; discretion; option &c (choice) 609; voluntariness^; spontaneity, spontaneousness; originality. pleasure, wish, mind; desire; frame of mind &c (inclination) 602; intention &c 620; predetermination &c 611; selfcontrol &c; determination &c (resolution) 604; force of will. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... apprentice's fee, or an outfit as a squire. It was a vague promise that cost him nothing just then, and thus could be readily made, and John's great desire was to get them away so that he could aver that they had gone by their own free will, without any hardship, for he had seen enough at his father's obsequies to show him that the love and sympathy of all the scanty dwellers in the ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge
... of fortune, who, sooner than starve at home or go to jail, serve Leopold in the jungle, seem more like men and brothers than these truly rich, who, of their own free will, safe in their downtown offices, become ...
— The Congo and Coasts of Africa • Richard Harding Davis
... the rights and benefits of this worshipful Lodge, dedicated (some say erected) to God, and held forth to the holy order of St. John, as all true fellows and brothers have done, who have gone this way before him." The Junior Deacon then asks, "Is it of his own free will and accord he makes this request? Is he duly and truly prepared? Worthy and well qualified? And properly avouched for?" All of which being answered in the affirmative, the Junior Deacon says to the Senior Deacon, "By what further right does he expect to obtain this benefit?" The ...
— The Mysteries of Free Masonry - Containing All the Degrees of the Order Conferred in a Master's Lodge • William Morgan
... divinity, which lay upon the table beside her. Her spectacles reposed upon the open page, where she had laid them down while she meditated, as was her custom, upon knotty points of doctrine, touching free will, necessity, and election by grace; regarding works as a garment of filthy rags, in which publicans and sinners who trusted in them were damned, while in practice the good soul was as earnest in performing them as if she believed her salvation ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... beneficial, the other injurious to them. In the animals of the forest, the plants, the stones, in everything, they trace these beneficent or demoniacal powers. Every idea, every action is with them a consequence of the influence of one of these two powers, and free will is impossible. Though a rude materialism cripples the intelligence of these Indians, yet they seem to be sensible of the connexion between that which is perceptible to their senses, and something higher—something beyond the sphere ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... Napoleonic militarism was not crushed at Waterloo and revived in 1849, because Napoleon still retained the allegiance of the French people. It is inconceivable that the German reactionaries will abdicate of their own free will. It is equally inconceivable that the reaction will develop slowly and gradually into a free democratic government, as von Bethmann-Hollweg would make us believe in the historic speech of February ...
— German Problems and Personalities • Charles Sarolea
... on fighting as long as it is necessary to get a decision in this war.... But I will not hate Germans to the order of any bloody politician; and the first thing I shall do after I am free will be to go to Germany and create all the ties I can with German life."—J. H. KEELING ...
— The Better Germany in War Time - Being some Facts towards Fellowship • Harold Picton
... possessing some rudimentary power of movement and therefore able to swerve slightly in their regular downward course. That explains how they have become infinitely tangled and mingled, how plants and animals are alive, and how men have Free Will. It also enables Epicurus to build up a world without the assistance of a god. He set man free, as Lucretius says, from the 'burden of Religion', though his doctrine of the 'blessed Being' which neither has pain nor gives pain, enables him to elude the dangerous ...
— Five Stages of Greek Religion • Gilbert Murray
... to stay in the town. I rather think that, through the evidence of Seltz, I can make it slightly uncomfortable for you. Tell what story you please. I have done you no injury. You came here of your own free will—you could have escaped and you would not. As for the light—" He laughed harshly. "An ordinary arc, focused on your eyes with a powerful lens. It would probably have blinded you, in time, and if it kept you awake long enough, you would no doubt have gone mad, but so far you are not hurt much. I ...
— The Ivory Snuff Box • Arnold Fredericks
... suspicious or troublesome to the State." As a principle, all religious communities should be judged in this way; for they are spontaneous bodies; they form their own organization, and without the aid of the State, through the free will of their members; they live apart, according to the proper and peculiar statute which they adopt, outside of lay society, alongside of the established Church, under distinct chiefs chosen by themselves, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 6 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 2 (of 2) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... to make his existence known by launching his thunderbolts. Miracles are not wrought on the challenge of a blasphemer more than on the demand of a sceptic; but both these unhappy men had probably before their death reason to confess, that in abandoning the wicked to their own free will, a greater penalty results even in this life, than if Providence had been pleased to inflict the immediate doom ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... children clambered out at last, and Susy chained the boat to a stick, which she drove into the sand. But the sand was light, and the boat was heavy, and the current strong; so before the children had walked a dozen rods, the Water-Kelpie was floating down stream of its own free will. ...
— Little Prudy's Dotty Dimple • Sophie May
... in all their detail, harmonizing with the outlawed loveliness of their country. For there is an untamed strength even in all that soft and habitable land. It is, indeed, gilded with corn and fragrant with deep grass, but it is not subdued to the plough or to the scythe. It gives at its own free will,—it seems to have nothing wrested from it nor conquered in it. It is not redeemed from desertness, but unrestrained in fruitfulness,—a generous land, bright with capricious plenty, and laughing from vale to vale ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... possession of a master is—unconsciously to themselves—the only possible completion of their lives. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred this one primitive instinct is at the bottom of the otherwise inexplicable sacrifice, when we see a woman, of her own free will, throw herself away on a man who is unworthy of her. This one primitive instinct was at the bottom of the otherwise inexplicable facility of ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... failed to bring a rush of color, a biting of the lip, or a quick change of position followed always by the troubled eyes and nervous manner that he had learned to dread. He noticed then that never, of her own free will, did she herself mention the man; never did she speak of him with the old frank lightness ...
— Miss Billy's Decision • Eleanor H. Porter
... mystery of its existence is at least in part explained. In the event of this surmise being substantiated, moral phantasms, with their mediaeval trappings, would for ever disappear; individual responsibility would be reduced within reasonable limits; the difficulty of the question respecting free will would shrink to comparatively narrow proportions; but it does not seem likely that the love of virtue and the hatred of vice would be diminished; on the contrary, it seems likely that they would be practically intensified, while a more practical direction would certainly be given to ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... it?" He came to a sudden stop in our walking. "I should only confess the body—is that it, Simon Kippen? And, of course, when a man confesses to one thing of his own free will, you know there must be something worse behind? Is that it, Simon?" He chuckled beside me and, as if only to scandalize me, let his tongue ...
— The Trawler • James Brendan Connolly
... your noble expeditions achieved in recovering the kingdom of Granada from the tyranny of the Saracens in these our days, do plainly declare your acts with so great glory of the divine name. For the which, as we think you worthy, so ought we of our own free will favorably to grant you all things whereby you may daily, with more fervent minds to the honor of God and enlarging the Christian empire, prosecute your devout and laudable purpose most acceptable to ...
— Great Epochs in American History, Volume I. - Voyages Of Discovery And Early Explorations: 1000 A.D.-1682 • Various
... much of this view of Time as Bergson. One might say it is the corner-stone of his philosophy, for practically the whole of it is built upon his conception of Time. His first large work, Essai sur les donnees immediates de la conscience, or, to give it its better title, in English, Time and Free Will, ...
— Bergson and His Philosophy • J. Alexander Gunn
... consolation had I felt myself to blame.—This morning we have grappled for and found another length of small cable which Mr. —— dropped in 100 fathoms of water. If this also gets full of kinks, we shall probably have to cut it after 10 miles or so, or, more probably still, it will part of its own free will or weight. ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the same work in the publisher's Office for the time being of the said work and not elsewhere for the inspection and perusal of each of the parties hereto his executors and administrators and whereto each of them may at all times resort and take copies thereof or extracts therefrom at their free will and pleasure and that the same Book shall at each of the aforesaid Weekly meetings be laid by the said publisher before the persons parties hereto attending the hereinbefore mentioned weekly meetings respectively which person shall at each such Meeting then and there ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... that the violence of the Vortex had sucked her in. Being in the movement of her own free will, she thought that by simply spinning round faster and faster she added her own energy to the whirl. It was not Dorothy's vortex, or the vortex of the fighting Suffrage woman. Desmond didn't care very much about the Suffrage; or about any kind of freedom but her own kind; or about anybody's ...
— The Tree of Heaven • May Sinclair
... prostitutes: eighteen informed me that they were in the habit of masturbating; eight of their own free will, without asking for reward, did fellatio; six asked me to do cunnilingus, which I naturally declined to do; three proposed anal coitus. Of those who did fellatio, two (one French and one German) told me that they had taken ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... which is recognized everywhere, but even he can scarcely succeed in locating Mr. Hamilton where we, with all the resources at our command, have failed. Mark my words, my dear Anita; if Ramon Hamilton returns, it will be voluntarily, of his own free will. Until—unless he so decides, you will never see him. It is too bad to have summoned Mr. Blaine here on a useless errand, but I am sure he ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander
... the huge circle whirled ever faster and faster, and that up and down on the flame of it coloured horses rose and fell, vanishing from light to darkness, from darkness to light, and seeming of their own free will and motion to dance ...
— Jeremy • Hugh Walpole
... I am loved at home, and how I love home. You can hardly think it perhaps, dear Mr Clennam,' she spoke with great agitation, 'seeing me going from it of my own free will and choice, but I do so dearly ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... little son! The Earl of Scilly chid me but this summer for sparing the rod and spoiling the child. But thy growth in all things bears out in what I answered him. I said: 'The boys of our house, my lord, take that pride in it that they learn of their own free will what many an earl's son must be driven to with rods.' He took me. His own son is little better than an idiot, and naught but the rod to blame ...
— Harding's luck • E. [Edith] Nesbit
... Sally Preston's first evening in Millbourne. She had arrived by the afternoon train from London—not of her own free will. Left to herself, she would not have come within sixty miles of the place. London supplied all that she demanded from life. She had been born in London; she had lived there ever since—she hoped to die there. She liked ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... agent represented to her that this could not be done without considerable loss. From year to year the business was delayed, till at length a gentleman, who had a plantation adjoining to hers, offered to purchase her estate. She was neither one of those ladies who, jealous of their free will, would rather act for themselves, that is to say, follow their own whims in matters of business, than consult men who possess the requisite information; nor was she so ignorant of business, or so indolent, as to be at the mercy of any designing agent or attorney. After consulting ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... commons at the same time, of their own free will, offered to pay as much as they had ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 1 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler
... rifest, richest there my soul that bound, Waken to life her tongue, and on the breeze Let her light silken hair, Loosen'd by Love's own fingers, float at ease; Do this, and I thy willing yoke will bear, Else thy hope faileth my free will ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch
... knowledge of the Divine as to realise that he is the offspring of the Absolute, and therefore stands face to face with his Transcendental Personality, his [Greek: Christos], of which the Physical Ego is only the outline or boundary form visible in the physical universe. Each individual has free will to define his own boundaries, his own limitations; he builds up the walls of the house in which he lives, and he has power to brick up or open out the windows through which he may see the Truth; happy are those whose ...
— Science and the Infinite - or Through a Window in the Blank Wall • Sydney T. Klein
... 3: That some who have hope fail to obtain happiness, is due to a fault of the free will in placing the obstacle of sin, but not to any deficiency in God's power or mercy, in which hope places its trust. Hence this does not prejudice ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... through the terribly cold and gloomy Siberia. Before and behind them rode Cossacks, who would not let them rest as they dragged their chains through the mud and mire of the road. Frequently women and children followed of their own free will to share their husbands' and fathers' fate during their forced labour in the mines. Now there is a great improvement. The labour, indeed, is just as hard, but the journey out is less trying. The unfortunate people are now forwarded in special prison vans with gratings for windows. They are ...
— From Pole to Pole - A Book for Young People • Sven Anders Hedin
... any subject, the position of reporter on an old-time daily approached the ideal. Even the drone became animated, when the copy must be in inside of two hours. The way to learn to write is to write. But young men will not write of their own free will; the literary first-mate in way of a Managing Editor with a loaded club of expletives is necessary. Or, stay! there is another way to stimulate the ganglionic cells and become dexterous in the cosmic ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... find this all out; and if the boys who have been bullying little Graham have not the bravery to come forward, and confess it of their own free will, I must take measures to discover who they were. But I warn them," added the doctor, "that if I find them out before they have come forward and freely confessed their base conduct, their time at this school will be short. To-day is a half-holiday. ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... I can possibly have aided you," Mrs. Carey replied quietly. "Gilbert was so rebellious about country schools, so patronizing, so scornful of their merits, that I fully expected he would never stay at the academy of his own free will. You have converted him, and ...
— Mother Carey's Chickens • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... consciousness feels the will to be—at once free and limited. The soul does not feel it is free to do anything it pleases. That at least is certain. For without some limitation, without something resistant to exert itself upon, the will could not be known. An absolutely free will is unthinkable. The very nature of the will implies a struggle with some ...
— The Complex Vision • John Cowper Powys
... whole is, that man having been endowed with free will, his happiness consists in making due elections, or in the right exercise of that free will. Five causes are then given of undue elections, in which of course his misery consists as far as that depends on himself; these causes ...
— The Fallen Star; and, A Dissertation on the Origin of Evil • E. L. Bulwer; and, Lord Brougham
... King of Temoria was conducted to Saint Finnianus that she might read the Psalms and the other Scriptures with the saint of God, and should dedicate her virginity. And when she promised of her own free will to preserve her virginity for Christ, Father Finnianus said to Saint Kiaranus, "Son, let this virgin, Christ's handmaid, daughter of an earthly king, read with thee in the meanwhile, till such time as a cell of virgins shall be built for her." Which duty Saint Kiaranus obediently accepted, ...
— The Latin & Irish Lives of Ciaran - Translations Of Christian Literature. Series V. Lives Of - The Celtic Saints • Anonymous
... not sorry. Death was the easiest possible solution of all his difficulties. He had looked for it many times; but he was glad to think that on this day, at least, he had not sought it of his own free will. He thought of his mother—he could not call her otherwise in this last hour—he thought of the father and the brother who had been dear to him in this world, and would not, he believed, be less dear to him in the next; he thought of Angela, who would be a little sorry for him, ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... who a few days before had been the Empress of the French, the Queen of Italy, the Regent of a vast empire, was in her father's presence merely a humble and docile daughter, who told him everything, obeyed him in everything, who abdicated her own free will, and promised, even swore, to entertain no other ideas or wishes than ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand
... Such Controversial Points as are not absolutely and essencially necessary to salvation. We also hope that though of ourselves we are altogether unworthy and unfit thus to offer up ourselves to God or to do him a—or to expect any favor with, or mercy from Him. He will graciously accept of this our free will offering in and through the merit and mediation of our Dear Redeemer. And that he will imploy and emprove us in his service to his Praise, to whom be all Glory, Honor, now and ...
— Bay State Monthly, Volume I, No. 2, February, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... facts and the theories of empire which had been shaping in the years which have been reviewed. The splendid response of the whole Empire to the call of need proved that it was not the weak and crumbling structure that enemies had hoped and zealous friends had feared. Of their own free will the Dominions and even India poured out their treasures of men and money in measure far beyond what any central authority could have ordained. Freedom was justified of her children, and the British Empire proved its right to exist by its very difference from the Prussian Empire. When ...
— The Day of Sir Wilfrid Laurier - A Chronicle of Our Own Time • Oscar D. Skelton
... keeps us fast to that anchor. 'Faith lays hold of that end of the promise that is nearest to us, to wit, in the Bible—Hope lays hold of that end that is fastened to the mercy-seat.' Thus the soul is kept by the mighty power of God. They who have no hope, enter Doubting Castle of their own free will—they place themselves under the tyranny of Giant Despair—that he may put out their eyes, and send them to stumble among the tombs, and leave their bones in his castle-yard, a trophy to his victories, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... of what may befall us, the sons of Usna, shalt thou never leave us, nor shalt thou go forth from us, but of thine own free will.' ...
— Celtic Tales - Told to the Children • Louey Chisholm
... it would follow that past, present and future are given from all eternity. But, on the other hand (and that is why the philosopher has not gone to these extreme consequences), Descartes believes in the free will of man. He superposes on the determinism of physical phenomena the indeterminism of human actions, and, consequently, on time-length a time in which there is invention, creation, true succession. This duration he supports on a God who is unceasingly renewing the creative act, ...
— Creative Evolution • Henri Bergson
... upon me. Your Royal Highness is marvelous. Am I to understand that the lady goes with you quite of her own free will?" ...
— The Princess Virginia • C. N. Williamson
... it well; I had occasion to say so to myself the other day. She came to see me, of her own free will, and for an hour she was deeply interesting. I think she 's an actress, but she believes in her part while she is playing it. She took it into her head the other day to believe that she was very unhappy, and she sat there, where you are ...
— Roderick Hudson • Henry James
... took her hence, But not by guile, nor yet enforcement, sir; But of her free will, knowing what she did. That, as I found, I cannot give her back, I own her state is changed, but in her place This maid I offer you, her image far As feature, form, complexion, nature go! Resemblance halting, only there, where thou Thyself didst pause, condition, for this maid Is gently born ...
— The Love-Chase • James Sheridan Knowles
... after my first communion. I left it openly, and of my own free will. Pray be good enough to allow me ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... would be, nevertheless, entirely from his own experience of ruined walls: and though he would draw ancient shipping (for an imitation of Vandevelde, or a vignette to the voyage of Columbus) from such data as he could get about things which he could no more see with his own eyes, yet when, of his own free will, in the subject of Ilfracombe, he, in the year 1818, introduces a shipwreck, I am perfectly certain that, before the year 1818, he had seen a shipwreck, and, moreover, one of that horrible kind—a ship dashed to pieces in deep water, at the foot of an inaccessible cliff. Having once ...
— The Harbours of England • John Ruskin
... resolution. It appears to me that the part of resignation in all things may be the most religious, and I am not surprised that pious men should have gone so far as to feel a sort of scruple about resolutions proceeding from free will. Necessity appears to bear a sort of divine character, while man's resolution may be connected with his pride. It is certain, however, that none of our faculties have been given us in vain, and that of deciding for one's self has also its use, On another side, all persons of mediocre intellect ...
— Ten Years' Exile • Anne Louise Germaine Necker, Baronne (Baroness) de Stael-Holstein
... feel the glow, the stern joy of the fight. But she!—let her leave the human brute and his unsavoury struggle alone! It cannot be borne—it was never meant—that she should dip her delicate wings, of her own free will at least, in such a mire of blood and tears. It was the feeling that had possessed him when Mrs. Boyce told him of the visit to the prison, the night ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... was a reporter on the New York Leader. His choice of an occupation had been made more at the dictate of circumstances than of his free will; and in the round hole of modern journalism he was something of a square and stubborn peg. He had become a reporter because he had no taste for business; and a newspaper office is the natural refuge for clever young men with a modicum of education, ...
— Two on the Trail - A Story of the Far Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... one of the religious orders; still less did they remember the dark, lank, heavy-browed girl who had sometimes been seen about Rough and Ready. For she had her brother's melancholy, and greater reticence, and had continued of her own free will, long after her girlish pupilage at the convent, to live secluded under its maternal roof without taking orders. A general suspicion that she was either a religious "crank," or considered herself too good to live in a mountain ...
— Tales of Trail and Town • Bret Harte
... silent. He had perceived, with the surprise of a mathematician working out a new problem, that the lie which Mr. Spence had just bought of him was exactly the one gift he could give of his own free will to Mr. Spence's son. This discovery gave the world a strange new topsy-turvyness, and set Millner's theories spinning about his brain like the cabin ...
— Tales Of Men And Ghosts • Edith Wharton
... of responsibility is all tangled up with our attitude towards and treatment of crime. Though clear thought makes mandatory the recognition of a universal cause and effect law, practical common sense has defined free will. Consent or the withholding of consent to a given course of action has been ...
— The Glands Regulating Personality • Louis Berman, M.D.
... court there was a half-uttered murmur of amazement. A man stood there to surrender his life, with all that was near and dear to it. Not dogged, trapped, made desperate by fate, but cheerfully and of his own free will. ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... believe in free will? I do—unreservedly. I don't agree at all with the philosophers who think that every action is the absolutely inevitable and automatic resultant of an aggregation of remote causes. That's the most immoral doctrine I ever heard—nobody would be to blame for anything. If a man believed in fatalism, ...
— Daddy-Long-Legs • Jean Webster
... necessary to repeat all that passed between us, the result is, that Evan Lamotte comes into this court of his own free will and accord, and it is his desire that he be allowed to tell ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... little; to pat us on the back and recommend a few moderate concessions; to say that there are two or three little points in which society has not been quite just to us. But any man who pretends to accept our programme in toto, as you and I understand it, of his own free will, before he is forced to—such a person simply schemes to betray us. There are gentlemen in plenty who would be glad to stop your mouth by kissing you! If you become dangerous some day to their selfishness, to their vested interests, ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. I (of II) • Henry James
... position to which the paramount Power in South Africa, the Power which of its own free will had conceded a limited independence to the Transvaal, found itself reduced. And yet it was possible for the Boer Government to maintain that there was nothing in all this legislation which was inconsistent with the terms of the convention ...
— Historical and Political Essays • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... insoluble mystery; and the minister's wife, far from making light of it, allowed its full weight to press in upon the members of her class, and wisely left the question as the apostle leaves it, with a statement of the two great truths of Sovereignty and Free Will without attempting the impossible task of harmonizing these into a perfect system. After a half-hour of discussion, she brought the lesson to a close with a very short and very simple presentation of the practical bearing of the great doctrine. And while the ...
— The Man From Glengarry - A Tale Of The Ottawa • Ralph Connor
... associations, called Caballeros Racionales, became very influential, and corresponded with the society of the Grand Reunion of America (Gran Reunion Americana) of London. This society was pledged "to recognize no government in America as legitimate unless it was elected by the free will of the people." San Martin joined this society. The London society was established by Miranda, the Spanish patriot, a friend of Bolivar, by whose inspirations San Martin became a disciple of liberty, and whose dreams he fulfilled long after the ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various
... narrow ordinances Let us not hold too lightly. They are weights Of priceless value, which oppressed mankind Tied to the volatile will of their oppressors. For always formidable was the league 65 And partnership of free power with free will. The way of ancient ordinance, though it winds, Is yet no devious way. Straight forward goes The lightning's path, and straight the fearful path Of the cannon-ball. Direct it flies and rapid, 70 Shattering that it may reach, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... Castlemain, showing her teeth. "Of course you were kidnapped! I'm sure nothing would induce so modest a lady as the fair Jennings to go of her own free will. She would insist on being taken by force. Ha! ...
— The Touchstone of Fortune • Charles Major
... boat, and the water bore him up, so that he walked upon it as if it were a floor, just as Christ did once upon the sea of Galilee. When the soldiers tried to do the same, however, thinking to follow and recapture him, they sank and were drowned. At last of his own free will Saint Blaise walked back to the shore, clothed in light and very beautiful to look upon; for he was ready and eager to die. He let the heathen seize him, and soon after ...
— The Book of Saints and Friendly Beasts • Abbie Farwell Brown
... dear, that a good many of your sex, both small and great, regard me as a very pretty fellow. In fact, I'm pestered with the women. I assure you I really am, my dear. And so you won't give me a kiss of your own free will? Why, I could take it if I liked; but I'm not sure that I want to take it till you come and offer it to me of ...
— The Story of Bawn • Katharine Tynan
... I seem to see it quite clearly—then in that White scheme is a singular flaw: at one point, it is obvious, that elaborate Forethought fails: for I have a free will—and ...
— The Purple Cloud • M.P. Shiel
... warning against evil consequences likely to ensue from the desired indulgence. This liability to flit from under the control of one feeling to the control of another, constitutes what is recognised as free will in man, being nothing more than a vicissitude in the supremacy of the ...
— Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation • Robert Chambers
... quite cheerful and good-humoured. Such a disposition, it was observed, was a happy gift of nature. JOHNSON. 'I do not think so; a man has from nature a certain portion of mind; the use he makes of it depends upon his own free will. That a man has always the same firmness of mind I do not say; because every man feels his mind less firm at one time than another; but I think a man's being in a good or bad humour depends upon his will.' I, however, could not help ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... the door, and keep remembering that of your own free will you are passing from this plane to ...
— The Doorway • Evelyn E. Smith
... urge, as was done afterwards, that he had acted on a preconceived scheme, and that his example had such weight, was only malicious falsehood. The Emperor himself knew well how little he owed to the free will of his Marshal, and he soon had to send him from Paris, as Ney, sore at heart, and discontented with himself and with both sides, uttered his mind with his usual freedom. Ney was first ordered to inspect the frontier from Dunkirk to Bale, ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... Nothing, then, is exempt from the laws of physics and chemistry. Inorganic substance and organic life fall into the same category. Man himself with all his differentiated faculties is but a function of matter and motion in extraordinary complex and involved relations. Man's imputation to himself of free will and unending consciousness apart from his machine is an idle tale built on his desires, not on his experiences nor his knowledge of nature. This imputation of a will or soul to nature, independent ...
— Baron d'Holbach • Max Pearson Cushing
... thus reaffirmed and extended, but how can man attain that ideal? By using his free will, said the Stoic. By the grace of God obtained through prayer, said the Christian. Is man then free, or is he the passive creature of a greater power, and of what nature is that power? Now, where theologians have sought to define the Deity, and to conceive his government of his creatures in terms ...
— The Chief End of Man • George S. Merriam
... the sound of a Russian spirit been heard here; and now a Russian spirit comes to sight!" Then she asked Prince Astrach: "Wherefore, good youngling, Prince Astrach, art thou come hither—of thine own free will or not? Hither no bird flies, no wild beast wanders, no knight ever passes my hut. And how has ...
— The Russian Garland - being Russian Falk Tales • Various
... chanced, by good fortune, to be seated near a window where a crafty spider and a foolish buzzing fly could be watched through the dreary exposition and attempted reconciliation of predestination and free will, that indeed were a happy way of passing ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle
... appearance, than was this earnest attempt to reconcile reason with faith? The finest minds and characters of the church entered into the discussion with singular intensity and ardor. They would explain the Man-God, the Trinity, the Word made flesh, and all the other points which grew out of grace and free will. A dialectical spirit arose, which combated or explained what had formerly been received with unquestioning submission. In the first century there was scarcely any need of creeds, for the faith of the Christians was united ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord
... proportions. In fact, the maiden ladies of Andover always, I fancied, regarded each other with a peculiar sense of peace. Each knew—and knew that the rest knew—that it was (to use the Andover phraseology) not of predestination or foreordination, but of free will absolute, that an Andover girl passed through life alone. This little social fact, which is undoubtedly true of most, if not all, university towns, had mingled effects upon impressionable girls. For the proportion of masculine society was ...
— McClure's Magazine, January, 1896, Vol. VI. No. 2 • Various
... feeling at the North, and partly because of the enactment of a tariff law which was felt to be unjust, and on October 25, 1832, the South Carolina legislature passed an ordinance asserting that, since the state had entered the Union of its free will, it could withdraw from it at any time and resume the sovereign and independent position which it had held at the close of the Revolution, and that it would do so should there be any attempt to enforce the ...
— American Men of Action • Burton E. Stevenson
... glory of God; and as colours attract the attention of children as soon as any thing, they eagerly inquire what such a thing is, and this gives the teacher an opportunity of instructing them to great advantage; for when a child of his own free will eagerly desires to be informed, he is sure to profit by ...
— The Infant System - For Developing the Intellectual and Moral Powers of all Children, - from One to Seven years of Age • Samuel Wilderspin
... of the little bride heard this sweet singing, she became strong, and followed the bird even to the gates of heaven; and there she paused, trembling, afraid to knock, for she had gone forth of her own free will, and she had returned with a burden that she had no ...
— The Story and Song of Black Roderick • Dora Sigerson
... the dependent position into which she had carelessly rushed, relying on the family feeling that had hitherto made all things as one. 'Henceforth,' said she, 'I take my share of all that we spend. I will not sell my free will.' ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... bursts upon the scene at the critical moment, detaches Emily from her party, and leads her slowly forward. He is unutterably sad. He questions her very tenderly; asks her whether she is not enforced; whether she is taking this step of her own free will and accord; whether she has indeed dismissed the dear, old fond love for him from her heart forever? He must hear it from her own lips. When timidly and feebly informed that such is indeed the case, he requests ...
— What Answer? • Anna E. Dickinson
... when they reached down their hands to Gaspar's shoulders to drag him to his feet, he avoided them with a shudder and of his own free will rose and ...
— The Rangeland Avenger • Max Brand
... the beginning man was perfect but yielded to temptation, and since then has been the subject of an everlasting contest between the powers of light and the powers of darkness for the possession of his soul; that man not only knew good from evil, but was endowed with "free will," and had the power to choose between good and evil; and that when he did wrong he deliberately chose to do so out of an abandoned and malignant heart; and that all men alike were endowed with this power and all alike were responsible ...
— Crime: Its Cause and Treatment • Clarence Darrow
... that heresie began to spread within this land verie much, by the lewd industrie of one Leporius Agricola, the sonne of Seuerus Sulpitius (as Bale saith) a bishop of that lore. But Pelagius the author of this heresie was borne in Wales, and held opinion that a man might obteine saluation by his owne free will and merit, and without assistance of grace, as he that was ...
— Chronicles 1 (of 6): The Historie of England 5 (of 8) - The Fift Booke of the Historie of England. • Raphael Holinshed
... one whose union would not be advantageous in a worldly point of view. I never would give such pain to the poor father, or to the kind soul who never said a harsh word to me since I was born. My grandmamma is kind, too, in her way. I came to her of my own free will. When she said she would leave me her fortune, do you think it was for myself alone that I was glad? My father's passion was to make an estate, and all my brothers and sisters will be but slenderly portioned. Lady Kew said she would help them if I came to her—and—it ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... whose body and arms are free will cry less than one bound fast in swaddling clothes. He who feels only physical wants cries only when he suffers, and this is a great advantage. For then we know exactly when he requires help, and we ought not to delay one moment in giving him help, ...
— Emile - or, Concerning Education; Extracts • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... go, the parent glad Of Aragonia and Sicilia's pride; And of the truth inform her, if of me Aught else be told. When by two mortal blows My frame was shatter'd, I betook myself Weeping to him, who of free will forgives. My sins were horrible; but so wide arms Hath goodness infinite, that it receives All who turn to it. Had this text divine Been of Cosenza's shepherd better scann'd, Who then by Clement on my hunt was set, Yet at the bridge's head my bones had lain, Near ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante
... baronet opened his door and called for me. "Barrymore considers that he has a grievance," he said. "He thinks that it was unfair on our part to hunt his brother-in-law down when he, of his own free will, ...
— The Hound of the Baskervilles • A. Conan Doyle
... took no step whatever in the matter. I didn't say a word when before my eyes you stripped me of my entire worldly possessions—you know I didn't. You burned it up yourself, Billy Woods—of your own free will and accord—and now Selwoode and all that detestable money belongs to you, and I'm sure I'd like to know what you are going to do ...
— The Eagle's Shadow • James Branch Cabell
... have scratched Messer Aragazzi's sleeping figure with graffiti at their own free will. Yet they have had no power to erase the poetry of Donatello's mighty style. That, in spite of Bruni's envy, in spite of injurious time, in spite of the still worse insult of the modernised cathedral and the desecrated monument, ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... whole discourse seems to have grown out of the subject of Necessity and Free Will. Now, when a boy, I recollect hearing a sage say, that these things ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II (of 2) • Herman Melville
... gone off with no swag, and then written you this letter, you would not have believed me. You would have thought it was merely another of my failures. But when I have actually got all your papers into my hands, and give them up again of my own free will, you must see that ...
— An African Millionaire - Episodes in the Life of the Illustrious Colonel Clay • Grant Allen
... powerless, if he stands alone, as if he had it not. To render it of any avail he must associate himself with a party, and look for his success in the success of his party; and to secure the success of his party, he must give up to it his own private convictions and free will. In practice, individuals are nothing individually, and parties are every thing. Even the suppression of the late rebellion, and the support of the Administration in doing it, was made a party question, and the government found the leaders of the party ...
— The American Republic: Its Constitution, Tendencies, and Destiny • A. O. Brownson
... cut her head off, and he did not want people to know the truth because it would make him look foolish. In fact, the more he considered the matter, the more he felt that he would be wise to put a good face on it, and to let people suppose that he had really brought about the marriage of his own free will. ...
— The Brown Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... principle. Besides, tyranny has generally some personal gain in view when it takes in hand to force people to do what they do not like to do; while interference seeks no good for itself at all, but simply prevents the exercise of free will for the mere pleasure to be had out of such prevention. Again, the idea of tyranny is political rather than domestic, but the curse of interference is seen most distinctly within the four walls of home, where also it is felt the most. Very many people ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous
... anticipate the high qualities given proof of in the late development of Italian nationality. He made the best terms he could, having had his hand forced. In consequence of this treaty he has carried out his engagement to Austria in certain official forms, knowing well that the free will and choice of the Italians are hindered by none of them; and knowing besides that every apparent coldness and reserve of his towards the peninsula removes a jealousy from England, and instigates her to a more liberal ...
— What I Remember, Volume 2 • Thomas Adolphus Trollope
... blemishes when they were considered so to be." The choice of the princess, continued the learned Brahmin, has however not been made; she has left to chance that which was to have proceeded from her own free will, and that without consulting with the ministers of our holy religion. My heart told me yesterday that such was not right, and contrary not only to the king's will, but the will of Heaven; and I communed deeply on the subject after I had prayed nine times—and a dream descended on me in my sleep, ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Captain Frederick Marryat
... like Henry himself, within the Shawnee ring, but, unlike him, not there of his own free will. The shots and the war whoops had terrified him to the utmost, and they had always driven him back toward the center of the circle. Henry, moved by a spirit that was as much friendliness as sport, uttered a low woof. The bear paused, raised his head a little higher, and inhaled the wind. ...
— The Eyes of the Woods - A story of the Ancient Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... because they must, or because they will. The Hebrew has experienced both motives for travelling. Irresistibly driven on by his own destiny and by the pressure of his fellow-men, the Jew was also gifted with a double share of that curiosity and restlessness which often send men forth of their own free will on long and arduous journeys. He has thus played the part of the Wandering Jew from choice and from necessity. He loved to live in the whole world, and the whole world met him by refusing him a single spot that he might call his ...
— The Book of Delight and Other Papers • Israel Abrahams
... Dr Robson," cried the landlady sturdily. "Don't you know that the poor fellows over yonder never get good honest shillings given to them and are enlisted of their own free will like our lads at home, but they are dragged away and are obliged to fight; and it was all owing to the angry jealousy and covetousness of that dreadful man, Bony, who has been the cause ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn
... civilized man, and it is with pride that he will adopt such usages as do not interfere too much with his sloth, his passions, or his prejudices. But as the willful child or the idle schoolboy, who was never taught obedience, and never made to do anything which of his own free will he was not inclined to do, would in most cases obtain neither education nor manners; so it is much more unlikely that the savage, with all the confirmed habits of manhood and the traditional prejudices of race, should ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume I. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... alluded to as eminently characteristic of the Sagas is their fatefulness. As we read we seem to hear the voice of Doom speaking continually. "Things will happen as they are fated": that is the keynote of them all. The Norse mind had little belief in free will, less even than we have to-day. Men and women were born with certain characters and tendencies, given to them in order that their lives should run in appointed channels, and their acts bring about an appointed ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard
... practically acknowledges his guilt," said the sheriff. "In any case, I should be compelled as an officer to arrest him, since the papers were placed in my hands. Still I think if he were to turn State's evidence—that is, to tell of his own free will all the facts connected with the affair—the court would probably deal more leniently ...
— Under Fire - A Tale of New England Village Life • Frank A. Munsey
... herself, since it is time, and manage that Cardinal Campodonico shall never suspect that there has been anything wrong with the administration. If she is not so charitable as to do that of her own free will, why then, since you believe it, tell her that she must do it to save her life. It is most unlikely that she will refuse and take refuge with the cardinal in order to bring public disgrace upon her ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford
... subjective causes to objective. Many writers have contended that this is possible, but we shall see that there are causes in heredity and causes in psychological conditions, to say nothing of some possible free will in individuals, which cannot be derived from social conditions and which would produce crime quite independent of objective social conditions, unless these subjective factors were also controlled. There is no reason ...
— Sociology and Modern Social Problems • Charles A. Ellwood
... there is no such thing as responsibility, no such thing as justice. Oh, I see, you deny free will. ...
— Dr. Heidenhoff's Process • Edward Bellamy
... unites people to form a nation is not the force of history; it is the desire to be together, and the mutual need felt by the members of the nation. Our thoughts and our feelings are not guided by the vows that others have made for us, but by our own free will. ...
— The Forerunners • Romain Rolland
... to Aiwohikupua, "You managed the affair awkwardly. I do not believe her to be a stubborn woman; give me a chance to stand before her eyes; I should not have to speak, she would come of her own free will to meet me, then you would ...
— The Hawaiian Romance Of Laieikawai • Anonymous
... what works: Freedom works. We know what's right: Freedom is right. We know how to secure a more just and prosperous life for man on Earth: through free markets, free speech, free elections, and the exercise of free will ...
— United States Presidents' Inaugural Speeches - From Washington to George W. Bush • Various
... exiles of 1881 and previous years were pardoned by the same ukase that liberated the Russian exiles of 1825. Just before the insurrection of 1863 there were not many Poles in Siberia, except those who remained of their own free will. The last insurrection caused a fresh deportation, twenty-four thousand being banished beyond the Ural Mountains. Ten thousand of these were sent to Eastern Siberia, the balance being distributed in the governments west of the Yenesei. The decree of June, ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox
... went o' my own free will. No man should persuade I—trust Joe for thic: couldn't persuade I to goo, nor yet not ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... look to you," she whispered. Combined fear and entreaty filled her eyes and she put her hand upon his sleeve. His own caught it and pressed it. He forgot everything before her words. She had come to him at last of her own free will. ...
— The Red Redmaynes • Eden Phillpotts
... Makan, "And who be this bitch that seeketh for me? Allah curse her and curse her husband with her!"[FN315] And he began to revile the Eunuch, who could make him no answer, because his mistress had charged him to do Zau al-Makan no hurt, nor bring him save of his own especial free will; and, if he would not accompany him, to give him the thousand diners. So the Castrato began to speak him fair and say to him, "O my lord, take this purse and go with me. We will do thee no upright, O my son, nor wrong thee in aught; but our object is that thou ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... beginning to take off his shoes, ran up to him and loosed his shoes and helped him to anoint himself. And henceforward Favonius continued to wait on Pompeius and serve him, just as slaves do their master, even to the washing of his feet and preparing his meals, so that a witness of the free will of that service and the simplicity and absence of all affectation might ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch
... that month had closed it was agreed that they should look forward to the late summer or early autumn as the time of their departure to Italy. Not until March would Miss Barrett permit Browning to fetter his free will by any engagement; then, to satisfy his urgent desire, she declared that she was willing to chain him, rivet him—"Do you feel how the little fine chain twists round and round you? do you hear the stroke of the riveting?" But the links were of a kind to be loosed if need ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... his willingness to assist. He knew the channel very well, he continued, and would do his part. And then the most surprising thing happened. Of his own free will the captive told how he and his two companions aboard the U-boat had been pressed into the submarine service against their will. They had not desired to embark with one of the undersea fleet, but had been compelled to enlist ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Submarine Fleet • James R. Driscoll
... last, on consideration that my housekeeper would never have such a chance again, that I was not sure that I could always make her happy, I resolved to be generous, and determined to write to Lebel that Madame Dubois had decided of her own free will to become his wife, that I had no right to oppose her resolution, and that I would go so far as to congratulate him on a happiness I envied him. I begged him to leave Soleure at once and come and receive her in my presence from the hands ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... Father Thames and his silver streams, and the sweet salt air of the sea! Here, take my arm, fair lady,' he said to Althea as we went along; 'I have my doubts of your obedience—Lucy I can trust to come with me of free will.' So she took his ...
— Andrew Golding - A Tale of the Great Plague • Anne E. Keeling
... over his attitude towards those two great difficulties in the formation of a philosophy of history on which I have touched above. I mean the assertion of extra-natural interference with the normal development of the world and of the incalculable influence exercised by the power of free will. ...
— Miscellanies • Oscar Wilde |
