a. [UN-1 7.]
1. Involuntary; unintentional; undesigned.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., VII. xviii. (Bodl. MS.). Unwilful rennyng of teeres falleþ in þe yȝen somtyme of outeward causes.
c. 1430. Life St. Kath. (1884), 38. Þe vnwylfulle confession of fendes ys not to be sette lyght by.
c. 1450. Myrr. our Ladye, 51. He that leuyth oughte by vnwylfull neglygence … synneth not deadly.
1577. trans. Bullinger’s Decades, 511/1. Of sinnes some are wilfull and some vnwilfull, or inforced.
1603. H. Chettle, Eng. Mourn. Garment, D 2. How euer wilfull or vnwilfull the acte was, done it was.
a. 1711. Ken, Hymnotheo, Poet. Wks. 1721, III. 128. Few Years will wash away unwilful Taints.
1751. Richardson, Clarissa (ed. 4), I. 7. To make excuses … for the perhaps not unwilful slights of those whose approbation we wish to engage.
2. Not willful, obstinate, or perverse. rare.
1570. Levins, Manip., 186. Vnwilfull, illicentiosus, continens.
1863. Cowden Clarke, Shaks. Char., vii. 184. As if, at his years, Lear … could become unwilful, and even pliable.
