will (third-person singular simple presentwill,present participlewilling,simple pastwould,no past participle)
(auxiliary)Used to express the future tense, sometimes with an implication ofvolition ordetermination when used in the first person. Compareshall.[from 10th c.]
Do not forget,will you?
Will you be doing the shopping this evening? If so,will you do mine too, please?
Won't you have another glass of wine? No, I think I’ll go to bed.
Can somebody lend me a hand? ~ Iwill.
I'm going to quit smoking. I reallywill!
The Presidentwill arrive at 10.00 -Will she be wanting lunch?
If youwill come this way, I’ll show you your bedroom.
If your siswon’t be here on Thu, we’d better cancel the booking. - Iwill pray that she arrives on time.
That'll be £69.99, please. Last for ever this pair of jeans surewill.
This breakthroughwill mean that we spend less on the electricity bill.
We'll finish ours sooner than you (do/will).
Dad,will you take me to the park?Will you, please? -Will you be quiet! I'm on the phone.
I'll hold that for you, shall I?
The babywill surely have green eyes, because both parents have.
Good fool, as ever thouwilt deserve well at my hand, help me to a candle, and pen, ink and paper : as I am a gentleman, Iwill live to be thankful to thee for’t.
“Iwill, with your leave, relate to you, miss, the story of one of our customers.”
(auxiliary) To be able to, to have the capacity to.[from 14th c.]
Unfortunately, only one of these gloveswill actually fit over my hand.
(auxiliary)Expressing a present tense or perfect tense with some conditional or subjective weakening: "will turn out to", "must by inference".[from 15th c.]
Hewill be home by now. He always gets home before 6 o'clock.
I can't find my umbrella. Iwill've left it at home this morning.
I’ll kill anybody who touches my car.
2007, Edward Jesko,The Polish:
“Thatwill be five zloty.” I reached into my pocket and came up with some coins.
2012, Penny Freedman,All The Daughters:
Unless she diverted on the ten minute walk home, she’ll have got home at about half past.
But which of you hauing a seruant plowing, or feeding cattell,will say vnto him by & by when he is come from the field, Goe and sit downe to meate? Andwill not rather say vnto him, Make ready wherewith I may suppe, and gird thy selfe, and serue me, till I haue eaten and drunken: and afterward thou shalt eate and drinke.
As young menwill, I did my best to appear suave and sophisticated.
2009, Stephen Bayley,The Telegraph,24 Sep 09:
How telling is it that many womenwill volunteer for temporary disablement by wearing high heeled shoes that hobble them?
2011, “Connubial bliss in America”, inThe Economist:
So far neither side has scored a decisive victory, though eachwill occasionally claim one.
(auxiliary) Tochoose oragree to (do something);used to express intention but without any temporal connotations, often in questions and negation.[from 10th c.]
Will you marry me?
Whatwill you drink?
I’ve told him three times, but hewon’t take his medicine.
see God's goodwill toward men, hear how generally his grace is proposed, to him, and him, and them, each man in particular, and to all. 1 Tim. ii. 4. "Godwill that all men be saved, and come to the knowledge of the truth."
Historically,will is used as a future tense auxiliary only with second and third person subjects, whileshall is used with the first person. The intent sense, on the other hand, reverses this, withwill being used with the first person, andshall with the second and third. This distinction may still be upheld by some speakers, especially in the UK, or in legal documents.
Today, the person distinction is mostly lost, usually with bothwill andshall being used with interchangeable meaning. In particular,shall is used as a rarer or more archaic synonym ofwill, leaving the distinction between future and intent up to context or stress.
Morphologically, the present tense iswill and the past tense iswould. In Early Modern English there was also a past participlewould, but this is now obsolete.
Malory: ‘Many tymes he myghte haue had her and he had wold’. John Done: ‘If hee had would, hee might easily [...] occupied the Monarchy.’
Formerly,go could be elided afterwill along with an adverb expressing destination, e.g. "I'll to her lodgings" (Marlowe). Compare the omission ofgehen in similar situations in modern German (i.e. with an auxiliary and a destination adverb), e.g. "Ich muss in die Schule", lit. "I must in(to) the school".
The present participlewilling does not apply to the uses ofwill as an auxiliary verb (those senses have no participles).
The form ofwill with the enclitic-n't (or the present tense negative form ofwill in the analysis in which-n't is an inflectional suffix) iswon't(“will not”) (rather than the form that would be expected based on a regular application of-n't,willn't), while the corresponding form of the past tensewould iswouldn't.
Korean:-을 것이다(-eul geosida) /-ㄹ 것이다(-l geosida)(adjustments to the speech level is required,것(geot) is mostly abbreviated to거(geo)),-을게(-eulge) /-ㄹ게(-lge),-겠-(-get-)(infix)
Turkish: (2): suffix for all verbs:-ecek (if the last vowel of a verb is e,i,ö or ü) or-acak (if the vowel is a,ı,o or u).
Ukrainian:Use the future perfective oruse the future ofбу́ти(búty) + imperfective infinitive; special endings, e.g. "I will walk":ходи́тиму (ходи́ти(xodýty) +иму)
The father chose the name and could change it later at hiswill.
2012 May 27, Nathan Rabin, “TV: Review: THE SIMPSONS (CLASSIC): “New Kid On The Block” (season 4, episode 8; originally aired 11/12/1992)”, inThe Onion AV Club[1]:
The episode’s unwillingness to fully commit to the pathos of the Bart-and-Laura subplot is all the more frustrating considering its laugh quota is more than filled by a rollicking B-story that finds Homer, he of the iron stomach and insatiable appetite, filing a lawsuit against The Frying Dutchman when he’s hauled out of the eatery against hiswill after consuming all of the restaurant’s shrimp (plus two plastic lobsters).
One'sintention ordecision; someone's orders or commands.[from 9th c.]
1998, John Skorupski,, Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy , Mill, John Stuart (1806–73):
Thus Mill’s case for the claim that happiness is the sole human end, put more carefully, is this: ‘Whatever is desired otherwise than as a means to some end beyond itself, and ultimately to happiness, is desired as itself a part of happiness, and is not desired for itself until has become so’ (1861a: 237). Nothing here assumed Hume’s view that every action must ultimately flow from an underived desire. That is a quite separate issue, and Mill’s view of it is closer to that of Kant or Reid than to that of Hume. He insists ‘positively and emphatically’ thatthewill is a different thing from desire; that a person of confirmed virtue, or any other person whosepurposes are fixed, carries out his purposes without any thought of the pleasure he has in contemplating them, or expects to derive from their fulfilment. (1861a: 238)This distinction between purpose and desire is central to Mill’s conception of thewill. When we develop purposes we can will against mere likings or aversions: ‘In the case of an habitual purpose, instead of willing the thing because we desire it, we often desire it only because we will it’ (1861a: 238). Every action is caused by a motive, but not every motive is a liking or aversion: When the will is said to be determined by motives, a motive does not mean always, or solely, the anticipation of a pleasure or of a pain….A habit of willing is commonly called a purpose; and among the causes of our volitions, and of the actions which flow from them, must be reckoned not only likings and aversions, but also purposes. (1843: 842)The formation of purposes from desires is the evolution ofwill; it is also the development of character. Mill quotes Novalis: ‘a character is a completely fashioned will’ (1843: 843).
2015, Dr. Harlan K. Ullman,Huffington Post 31 May 2015., "Winston Spencer Ghani":
...surely the link could not have been with Churchill the brilliant, gallant and steadfast wartime leader who, by dint of character,will and language, turned near defeat into victory.
(law) A formal declaration of one's intent concerning the disposal of one's property and holdings after death; thelegal document stating such wishes.[from 14th c.]
1928, Lawrence R. Bourne, chapter 1, inWell Tackled![2]:
“Uncle Barnaby was always father and mother to me,” Benson broke in; then after a pause his mind flew off at a tangent. “Is old Hannah all right—in thewill, I mean?”
(archaic) That which is desired; one's wish.[from 10th c.]
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions atWiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
(transitive) Tobequeath (something) to someone in one's will (legal document).[from 15th c.]
Hewilled his stamp collection to the local museum.
(transitive) To exert one's force of will (intention) in order to compel, or attempt to compel, something to happen or someone to do something.[from 10th c.]
All the fans werewilling their team to win the game.
Jacob Poole (d. 1827) (before 1828) William Barnes, editor,A Glossary, With some Pieces of Verse, of the old Dialect of the English Colony in the Baronies of Forth and Bargy, County of Wexford, Ireland, London: J. Russell Smith, published1867,page59
