once the attention lessens the resistance in the appropriate
centres.

=Factors in Volitional Act.=--Such an act of volition, or will, is
usually analysed in the following steps:

1. Conflicting desires

2. Deliberation--weighing of motives

3. Choice--solving the problem

4. Expression.

As a mental process, however, an act of will does not include the fourth
step--expression. The mind has evidently willed, the moment a
conclusion, or choice, is reached in reference to the end in view. If,
therefore, I stand undecided whether to paint the house white or green,
an act of will has taken place when the conclusion, or mental decision,
has been reached to paint the house green. On the other hand, however,
only the man who forms a decision and then resolutely works out his
decision through actual expression, will be credited with a strong will
by the ordinary observer.

=Physical Conditions of Will.=--Deliberation being but a special case of
giving voluntary attention to a selected problem, it involves the same
expenditure of nervous energy in overcoming resistance within the brain
centres as was seen to accompany any act of voluntary attention. Such
being the case, our power of will at any given time is likely to vary in
accordance with our bodily condition. The will is relatively weak during
sickness, for instance, because the normal amount of nervous energy
which must accompany the mental processes of deliberation and choice is
not able to be supplied. For the same reason, lack of food and sleep,
working in bad air, etc., are found to weaken the will for facing a
difficulty, though we may nevertheless feel that it is something that
ought to be done. An added reason, therefore, why the victim of alcohol
and narcotics finds it difficult to break his habit is that the use of
these may permanently lessen the energy of the nervous organism. In
facing the difficult task of breaking an old habit, therefore, this
person has rendered the task doubly difficult, because the indulgence
has weakened his will for undertaking the struggle of breaking an old
habit. On the other hand, good food, sleep, exercise in the fresh air,
by quickening the blood and generating nervous energy, in a sense
strengthens the will in undertaking the duties and responsibilities
before it.

ABNORMAL TYPES OF WILL

=The Impulsive Will.=--One important problem in the education of the
will is found in the relation of deliberation to choice. As is