Sample sentences for COMPULSION

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Definition

a strong (possibly uncontrollable) urge to do something; or a force or a requirement that forces an action

compulsion = strong urge (possibly uncontrollable)

Some pay their taxes with a sense of philanthropy and others through compulsion.
She has a deep compulsion to make herself the center of attention.

compulsion = a strong (possibly uncontrollable) urge to do something

We cannot avoid using power, cannot escape the compulsion to afflict the world so let us ... love powerfully.
Martin Buber
I would not tell you on compulsion.
William Shakespeare -- King Henry IV, Part 1
Those who are asking for more government interference are asking ultimately for more compulsion and less freedom.
Ludwig von Mises
Winning doesn't satisfy us — we need to do it again, and again. ... When we lose, the compulsion to seek future success is overpowering... We are addicted.
Stuart Walker
I have no credit by it; it was by no choice of mine, but as if by compulsion, that I walked right up to the table and put my hand on his shoulder.
Robert Louis Stevenson -- Kidnapped
How can an act done under compulsion have any moral element in it...?
Auberon Herbert
Bodily exercise, when compulsory, does no harm to the body; but knowledge which is acquired under compulsion obtains no hold on the mind.
Plato -- The Republic
With the compulsion gone, I thought I had put the nightmare behind me.
Nicholas Sparks -- A Bend in the Road

compulsion = a strong (possibly uncontrollable) urge to do something

compulsion = a strong (possibly uncontrollable) urge to do something

Physical compulsion or restraint was effectual, of course, while it lasted.
Nathaniel Hawthorne -- The Scarlet Letter

compulsion = force

They swarmed all over each other in their frenzied compulsion to bludgeon him, kick him, gouge him, trample him.
Joseph Heller -- Catch-22

compulsion = a strong (possibly uncontrollable) urge to do something

He felt a compulsion back to all the standards he had so vaguely yet so desperately been fleeing.
Sinclair Lewis -- Babbitt

compulsion = a strong (possibly uncontrollable) urge to do something

He wondered vaguely whether in the abolished past it had been a normal experience to lie in bed like this, in the cool of a summer evening, a man and a woman with no clothes on, making love when they chose, talking of what they chose, not feeling any compulsion to get up, simply lying there and listening to peaceful sounds outside.
George Orwell -- 1984

compulsion = requirement or urge

And I told you it was because I had a compulsion, a feeling I just had to come to that particular place at that particular moment?
Madeleine L'Engle -- A Wrinkle in Time

compulsion = a strong urge to do something

if reasons were as plentiful as blackberries, I would give no man a reason upon compulsion
William Shakespeare -- Henry IV, Part 1

compulsion = force

Under what inward compulsion?
Aldous Huxley -- Brave New World
A compulsion had driven her here, and for the first time in three weeks the feeling was gone.
Nicholas Sparks -- The Notebook

compulsion = a strong (possibly uncontrollable) urge to do something

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