---
title: We cannot control our wills, nor the feelings of our hearts, by the… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: We cannot control our wills, nor the feelings of our hearts, by the force of custom. Who acts: We, our. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Old Bachelor's Nightcap, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/128/120/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/) / [The Old Bachelor's Nightcap](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/128/) / 120

# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Old Bachelor's Nightcap, sentence 120

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
We cannot control our wills, nor the feelings of our hearts, by the force of custom.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** We, our · **What happens:** not control, will · **To what, where:** wills

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Old Bachelor's Nightcap. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (We, our), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher.** This tree is Mova's own parse (the `en` model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg27200:128:120
# text = We cannot control our wills, nor the feelings of our hearts, by the force of custom.
1	We	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	4	advmod	_	_
4	control	control	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
5	our	our	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	6	nmod:poss	_	_
6	wills	will	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
8	nor	nor	CCONJ	CC	Polarity=Neg	10	cc	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	feelings	feeling	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	conj	_	_
11	of	of	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	our	our	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	13	nmod:poss	_	_
13	hearts	heart	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
15	by	by	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	force	force	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
18	of	of	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
19	custom	custom	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **control** | can | We | our wills |  |  |  | by the force of custom | vn enforce-63 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent will=Theme |
| 2 | **will** |  | our |  |  |  |  |  | nom will «cognition transitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .note -->
One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Project Gutenberg book 27200 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 119](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/128/119/)
- next →: [sentence 121](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/128/121/)
- ↑ back to [The Old Bachelor's Nightcap](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/128/)