text: - an effort or striving.
  - a force or tendency simulating a human effort.
  - (in the philosophy of Spinoza) the force in every animate creature toward the preservation of its existence.
  Origin of conatus
  1655–65; < Latin: exertion, equivalent to cōnā(rī) to attempt + -tus suffix of v. action
  Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
  Examples from the Web for conatus
  Conatus est omne divortium inter regiam majestatem et reginam dissuadere.History of the Reformation in the Sixteenth Century, Volume V
  J. H. Merle d'Aubigné
  Strange that this great length of time should not have produced even one new organ, or the marks of a conatus to produce one.The Religion of Geology and Its Connected Sciences
  - an effort or striving of natural impulse
  - (esp in the philosophy of Spinoza) the tendency of all things to persist in their own being
  C17: from Latin: effort, from cōnārī to try
  Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012