"The will to do springs from the knowledge that we can do"
About this Quote
Motivation, Allen suggests, isn’t a mystical spark; it’s an engineering problem. “The will to do” doesn’t descend from the heavens or arrive as a personality trait. It “springs” from something sturdier: the felt, almost bodily knowledge that an action is possible. The sentence is built like a quiet rebuke to melodramatic self-talk. If you’re waiting to want it badly enough, you’re already trapped in a fantasy of inspiration. Build competence first; desire will follow.
The subtext is classic early self-help with a moral spine: agency is cultivated, not granted. Allen wrote in a late-Victorian world obsessed with self-improvement, discipline, and the idea that character could be forged through thought. That context matters because the quote smuggles in an ethic of responsibility. If willpower depends on “knowledge,” then excuses become epistemic: you don’t lack drive, you lack proof. Get proof.
The line also works rhetorically because it reverses the popular story about action. We tend to imagine will as the cause and ability as the effect: try harder, then you’ll get good. Allen flips it: get good enough to know you can, and effort becomes less a heroic struggle than a reasonable next step. It’s a flattering doctrine in one way (you can manufacture will), and a demanding one in another (you must earn it through practice). In modern terms, it’s confidence as a byproduct of competence, not a substitute for it.
The subtext is classic early self-help with a moral spine: agency is cultivated, not granted. Allen wrote in a late-Victorian world obsessed with self-improvement, discipline, and the idea that character could be forged through thought. That context matters because the quote smuggles in an ethic of responsibility. If willpower depends on “knowledge,” then excuses become epistemic: you don’t lack drive, you lack proof. Get proof.
The line also works rhetorically because it reverses the popular story about action. We tend to imagine will as the cause and ability as the effect: try harder, then you’ll get good. Allen flips it: get good enough to know you can, and effort becomes less a heroic struggle than a reasonable next step. It’s a flattering doctrine in one way (you can manufacture will), and a demanding one in another (you must earn it through practice). In modern terms, it’s confidence as a byproduct of competence, not a substitute for it.
Quote Details
| Topic | Confidence |
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