The reason for a criminal murder may be the removal of an enemy, or some such idea, the impelling force the feeling of want, hate, revenge, or envy.
When the emotions are, of composite character, the reasons and impelling forces are generally mixed, often to so great an extent that it would be difficult for the author of the act himself to decide which was the leading motive. This is due to the fact that the impelling forces of a volitional act combine, just as the elements of a composite feeling do, to form a unitary whole in which all other impulses are subordinated under a single predominating one; the feelings of like direction strengthening and accelerating the effect, those of opposite direction weakening it. In the combinations of ideas and feelings which we call motives, the deciding importance in preparing for the act of will belongs to the feelings, that is, to the impelling forces, rather than to the ideas. This follows from the very fact that feelings are integral components of the volitional process itself, while, the ideas are of influence only indirectly, through their connections with the feelings. The assumption of a volition arising from pure intellectual considerations, of a decision opposed to the inclinations expressed in the feelings, is a psychological contradiction in itself. It rests upon the abstract concept of a transcendental will absolutely distinct from actual psychical volitions.
5. The combination of a number of motives, that is, of ideas and feelings which are distinguished in the composite train of emotions to which they belong, as those determining [p. 186] the discharge of the act, furnish the essential conditions for the development of will, and also for the discrimination of the single forms of volitional action.
The simplest case of volition is that in which a single feeling in an emotion of suitable constitution, together with its accompanying idea, becomes a motive and brings the processes to a close with its corresponding external movement. Such volitional processes determined by a single motive, may be called simple volitions. The movements in which they terminate are often designated impulsive acts. In popular parlance, however, this definition of impulse by the simplicity of the motive, is not sufficiently adhered to. Another element, namely, the character of the feeling that acts as impelling force, is here usually brought in. All acts that are determined by sense-feelings, especially common feelings, are generally called impulsive acts without regard to whether only a single motive or a plurality of motives is operative. This basis of discrimination is psychologically inappropriate and the complete separation of impulsive from volitional acts as a specifically distinct kind of psychical processes, which follows very naturally from it, is entirely unjustifiable.
By impulsive act, then. we mean a simple volitional act, that is, one resulting from a single motive, without reference to the position of this motive in the series of affective and ideational processes. Impulsive action, thus defined, must necessarily be the starting point for the development of all volitional acts, even though it may continue to appear along with the complex volitional acts. To be sure, the earliest impulsive acts are those which come from sense-feeling. In this sense most of the acts of animals are impulsive, but such impulsive acts appear continually in the case of man, partly as the results of simple sense-emotions, partly as the [p. 188] products of the habitual execution of certain volitional acts which were originally determined by complex motives.
6. When several feelings and ideas in the same emotion tend to produce external action, and when those components of an emotional train which have become motives tend at the same time towards different external ends, whether related or antagonistic, then there arises out of the simple act a complex volitional process. In order to distinguish this from the impulsive acts that precede it in the line of development, we call it a voluntary act.
Voluntary and impulsive acts have in common the characteristic of proceeding from single motives, or from complexes of motives that have fused together and operate as a single unequivocal impelling force. They differ in the fact that in voluntary acts the decisive motive has risen to do dominance from among a number of simultaneous and antagonistic motives. When a clearly perceptible strife between these antagonistic motives precedes the act, we call the volition by the particular name selective act, and the process preceding it a choice. The predominance of one over other simultaneous motives can be understood only when we presuppose such a strife in every case. But we perceive this strife now clearly, now obscurely, and now not at all. Only in the first case can we speak of a selective act in the proper sense. The distinction between voluntary and selective acts is by no means hard and fast. Still, in ordinary voluntary acts the psychical state is more like that in impulsive acts, while the difference between the latter and selective acts is clearly recognizable.
7. The psychical process immediately preceding the act, in which the final motive suddenly gains the ascendency, is called in the case of voluntary acts resolution, in the case of selective acts decision. The first word indicates merely [p. 189] that action is to be carried out in accordance with some consciously adopted motive; the second implies that several courses of action have been presented as possible and that a choice has finally been made.