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PART I.
Section I.
CONCERNING THE NATURE OF THE WILL
IT
may possibly be thought, that there is no great need of going about to
define or describe the Will; this word being generally as well
understood as any other words we can use to explain it: and so perhaps
it would be, not philosophers, metaphysicians, and polemic divines,
brought the matter into obscurity by the things they have said of it.
But since it is so, I think it may be of some use, and will tend to
greater clearness in The following discourse, to say a few things
concerning it.
And therefore I observe, that the Will (without any metaphysical refining) is, That by which the mind chooses any thing.
The faculty of the will, is that power, or principle of mind, by which
it is capable of choosing: an act of the will is the same as an act of
choosing or choice.
If any think it is a more perfect definition
of the will, to say, that it is that by which the soul either chooses or
refuse, I am content with it; though I think it enough to say, it is
that by which the soul chooses: for in every act of will whatsoever, the
mind chooses one thing rather than another; it chooses something rather
than the contrary or rather than the want or non-existence of that
thing. So in every act of refusal, the mind chooses the absence of the
thing refused; the positive and the negative are set before the mind for
its choice, and it chooses the negative; and the mind's making its
choice in that case is properly the act of the Will: the Will's determining between the two, is a voluntary determination; but that is the same thing as making a choice.
So that by whatever names we call the act of the Will, choosing,
refusing, approving, disapproving, liking, disliking, embracing,
rejecting, determining, directing, commanding, forbidding, inclining, or
being averse, being pleased or displeased with; all may be reduced to
this of choosing. For the soul to act voluntarily, is evermore to act
electively. Mr. Locke (1) says, " The Will signifies nothing but a power
or ability to prefer or choose." And, in the foregoing page, he says,
"The word preferring seems best to express the act of volition;" but
adds, that "it does it not precisely; for, though a man would prefer
flying to walking, yet who can say he ever wills it?" But the instance
he mentions, does not prove that there is any thing else in willing, but
merely preferring: for it should be considered what is the immediate
object of the will, with respect to a man's walking, or any other
external action; which is not being removed from one place to another;
on the earth or through the air; these are remoter objects of
preference; but such or such an immediate exertion of himself. The thing
next chosen, or preferred, when a man wills to walk is not his being
removed to such a place where he would be, but such an exertion and
motion of his legs and feet &c, in order to it. And his willing such
an alteration in his body in the present moment, is nothing else but
his choosing or preferring such an alteration in his body at such a
moment, or his liking it better than the forbearance of it. And God has
so made and established the human nature, the soul being united to a
body in proper state that the soul preferring or choosing such an
immediate exertion or alteration of the body, such an alteration
instantaneously follows. There is nothing else in the actions of my
mind, that I am conscious of while I walk, but only my preferring or
choosing, through successive moments that there should be such
alterations of my external sensations and motions; together with a
concurring habitual expectation that it will be so; having ever found by
experience, that on such an immediate preference, such sensations and
motions do actually, instantaneously, and constantly arise. But it is
not so in the case of flying; though a man may be said remotely to
choose or prefer flying; yet he does not prefer, or desire, under
circumstances in view, any immediate exertion of the members of his body
in order to it; because he has no expectation that he should obtain the
desired end by any such exertion and he does not prefer, or incline to,
any bodily exertion under this apprehended circumstance, of its being
wholly in vain. So that if we carefully distinguish the proper objects
of the several acts of the will, it will not appear by this, and such
like instances, that there is any difference between volition and
preference; or that a man's choosing liking best, or being pleased with a
thing, are not the same with his willing that thing. Thus an act of the
will is commonly expressed by its pleasing a man to do thus or thus ;
and a man doing as he wills, and doing as he pleases are in common
speech the same thing.
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