Will and Weakness

Aristotle's notion 'weakness of will' characterizes a failure to act in accordance with what one believes is best. In other words, it attributes to will an absolute deficiency. Nietzsche vacillates between diagnosing such weakness as relative to the strength of another will, and as the product of an internal deterioration. In contrast with both, for Formaterialism, Will, as exceeding given conditions, always entails strength, independently of any subsequent constraints, or of any retrospective judgment that an Excession was less robust than it might have been. Hence, on this model, Will, in itself, is never 'weak'.