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with the animal feelings and impulses. He is bovine a cow-like

creature in human form. Chewing the cud contemplatively, he
dreams of nothing at all. Such people cannot be said to live
at all, in the true sense of the term. They are perfectly satisfied
with their condition, and they neither desire nor deserve pity.
Their content is not the result of philosophical thought; the
weighing of advantages and disadvantages; the declining to pay
the price but from the inertia of the dull, inactive creatures,
reproduced in human form.
Lack of Imagination. This is another mark of the negative will.
The person lacks the creative mental faculty. He is not able to
look ahead and see things as they might be made to be. He is
unable to picture improved methods, and increased power. He
cannot see further ahead than the end of his nose and doesn t
want to do so. He sees what is going on in front of him, but he
cannot see the next step until it is manifested. He cannot make
a mental image of that which he wishes to be, and wants to
be and therefore cannot Will it to be. He is not necessarily
contented but his is the discontent of vague unrest and
uncertain discomfort. He is not able to picture himself as doing
better; being better, or having a better environment. He is a
human clam. No doubt the clam is spared much discomfort by
reason of its lack of imagination but who wants to be a clam?
Who, indeed, excepting the clam.
Lack of Decision. This is another mark of the negative will.
The person is unable to make up his mind. He may have desires,
aspiration and imagination, but he cannot make up his mind
what he wants to do, and whether he should do it even if he
wants to. He is like the donkey which the philosophers held
would starve to death between two equally attractive hay
stacks, because he couldn t make up his mind which one he
liked the better. Conflicting emotions, desires and feelings
disturb such a person and he is like a human tennis-ball that
is batted to and fro between the opposing motives. He is
always in a state of the lover who cried, How happy I d be with
The Marks of the Negative Will