Examples Of Free Will In Romeo And Juliet

Fate and free-will are both widely discussed topics in the world today. In William Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet, fate and free-will greatly influenced Romeo and Juliet’s lives at every opportunity. That influence was both good and bad, and led to their premature deaths at the end of the play. Fate can be described as the development of events beyond a person’s control, while free-will is the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate. Free-will caused Romeo and Juliet to fall in love with each other, make poor choices, and ultimately die an untimely death.
Romeo and Juliet made their own decisions as to who they fell in love with, and that decision was with each other. After the Capulet party where Romeo

and Juliet met for the first time, Romeo visited Juliet in her family’s orchard and she said:
Three words, dear Romeo, and good night indeed.
If that thy bent of love be honorable,
Thy purpose marriage, send me word tomorrow,
By one that I’ll procure to come to thee,
Where and what time thou wilt perform the rite;
And all my fortunes at thy foot I’ll lay
And follow thee my lord throughout the world (II.ii.143-149).

In this quote, Juliet tells Romeo that if he truly loves her, then he will make plans to marry her tomorrow and that she will be a true and loyal wife to him. This quote proves that free-will was the cause of the lovers’ unfortunate deaths because Juliet made the decision to be with Romeo even though he was supposed to be her enemy. She knew that only trouble would arise if their parents found out, yet she went ahead with the marriage anyway.
As a result of free-will, Romeo and Juliet made numerous bad choices throughout the play. After Romeo hears about Juliet’s “death,” he visits an apothecary to ask for a deadly poison that he can drink. Romeo wants to die because he can’t bear the thought of continuing life without Juliet. The apothecary says to Romeo, “Put this in any liquid thing you will/ And drink it off, and if you had the strength/ Of twenty men, it would dispatch you straight” (V.i.77-79). The apothecary tells Romeo what the poison will do to him and how to use it. This quote shows free-will is to blame for Romeo’s death because he made the poor decision to go out and buy a lethal poison that he knew could kill him. Nothing forced him to buy that poison, and it wasn’t “written in the stars” that he was going to use poison to kill himself. It was all his own

doing.
Romeo and Juliet were the cause of their own premature deaths. At the end of the play, Romeo goes to see Juliet in her tomb and says his goodbyes before drinking the poison from the apothecary. His last words were:
Come, bitter conduct; come, unsavory guide!
Thou desperate pilot, now at once run on
The dashing rocks thy seasick weary bark.
Here’s to my love! O true apothecary!
Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die (V.iii.116-120).
In this quote, Romeo is telling the poison to come and end his misery so he can be with Juliet in death. This quote shows that Romeo was the cause of his own death because he made the decision to drink the poison. If he had looked at Juliet a little closer instead of being so hasty, he would have seen that Juliet was not dead, but only sleeping. He could have prevented both of their deaths, but his rash decisions ended his life way before his time.
In conclusion, free-will was the cause of Romeo and Juliet’s untimely deaths. It caused them to fall in love, make bad decisions, and then die at a very young age. Fate had nothing to do with the lovers’ unfortunate deaths; it was all caused by Romeo and Juliet’s free-will. After meeting, they started making rash decisions without thinking things through. They were very young and didn’t realize the consequences their actions would have. The biggest consequence of Romeo and Juliet’s actions were their tragic deaths.