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VOLUNTARILY
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (adverb)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Out of your own free will
Example:
he voluntarily submitted to the fingerprinting
Classified under:
Antonym:
involuntarily (against your will)
Pertainym:
voluntary (of your own free will or design; done by choice; not forced or compelled)
Context examples:
Very likely he had spoken to him privately, and had threatened to expose him unless he voluntarily resigned his membership of the club, and promised not to play cards again.
(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
This unassuming style promotes study, that's why we adopt it, returned Laurie, who certainly could not be accused of vanity, having voluntarily sacrificed a handsome curly crop to the demand for quarter-inch-long stubble.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
For an instant his eyes closed—not with pain or sleep but voluntarily, as though he were bringing all his faculties to bear; when he opened them he said, hurriedly, and with more energy than he had yet displayed:—Quick, Doctor, quick. I am dying!
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
A training technique in which various bodily functions, such as heart rate, skin temperature, muscle tension, and brain activity are monitored so that people can learn to control them voluntarily so as to improve their health and physical performance.
(Biofeedback, NCI Thesaurus)
But I had voluntarily stripped myself of all those balancing instincts by which even the worst of us continues to walk with some degree of steadiness among temptations; and in my case, to be tempted, however slightly, was to fall.
(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
Notwithstanding the aversion with which I regarded the idea of entrapping him into any disclosure he was not prepared to make voluntarily, I should have taken him up at this point, but for the strange proceedings in which I saw him engaged; whereof his putting the lemon-peel into the kettle, the sugar into the snuffer-tray, the spirit into the empty jug, and confidently attempting to pour boiling water out of a candlestick, were among the most remarkable.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
I accompanied the whale-fishers on several expeditions to the North Sea; I voluntarily endured cold, famine, thirst, and want of sleep; I often worked harder than the common sailors during the day and devoted my nights to the study of mathematics, the theory of medicine, and those branches of physical science from which a naval adventurer might derive the greatest practical advantage.
(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)
Organized systems for providing comprehensive prepaid health care that have five basic attributes: (1) provide care in a defined geographic area; (2) provide or ensure delivery of an agreed-upon set of basic and supplemental health maintenance and treatment services; (3) provide care to a voluntarily enrolled group of persons; (4) require their enrollees to use the services of designated providers; and (5) receive reimbursement through a predetermined, fixed, periodic prepayment made by the enrollee without regard to the degree of services provided.
(Health Maintenance Organization, NLM, Medical Subject Headings)
To complete the favourable impression, she then told him what Mr. Darcy had voluntarily done for Lydia.
(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)
It made her animated—open hearted—she voluntarily said;—Oh! Miss Woodhouse, I hope nothing may happen to prevent the ball.
(Emma, by Jane Austen)
