1. One who desires; a wisher, Chiefly, now only, in obj. or advb. comb., as EVIL-WILLER, GOOD-WILLER, ILL-WILLER, WELL-WILLER, q.v. So † cursed willer, after evil-willer.
c. 1395. Plowman’s T., 228. Such willers of worship must evil fele. Ibid., 780. Such willers wit is nat worth a neld.
c. 1586. C’tess Pembroke, Ps. LXXXIX. viii. Not closly undermind by cursed willer, Nor overthrown by foe in open fight.
2. One who exercises his will; one who sets himself with conscious intention to do something; a voluntary agent.
1435. Misyn, Fire of Love, II. x. 96. Qwho-euer wyll to it myght cum, & ȝit it is not of ylk rynnar ne willar, bot of criste lufand, lyftand & takand [cf. Rom. ix. 16].
1534. Act 26 Hen. VIII., c. 13 § 1. Willers and wurkars of the same.
1549. Coverdale, etc., Erasm. Par. James iv. 1–6. There is nothynge harde to the louing willer.
a. 1677. Barrow, Serm. Luke xxii. 42, Wks. 1686, III. 45. Who the willer is to whom we must submit.
1678. Norris, Coll. Misc. (1699), 289. Every Dependence of an irregular Act upon the Will, is not such as derives Guilt upon the Willer.
1850. Kingsley, Alton Locke, xvi. Nature was spoken of as the willer and producer of all the marvels which he describes.
1872. Dublin Rev., April, 368. The Fathers … fixing their eyes upon the oneness of the thing willed and the oneness of the willer.
b. spec. One who influences another by mere exercise of will, as in hypnotism.
1882. Barrett, Gurney & Myers, in 19th Cent., June, 892. A much larger percentage of successful results … occurred when a near relative of the guesser was the ‘willer.’
