Attorney at will

In the Philippines, as in the US,  attorney refers to a lawyer. But an attorney does not always need to be a lawyer as exemplified in a line about lawyers among Cebuanos: "'Torney, abogado diay ka?" I think it has an equivalent in other Philippine languages. Go, let a Cebuano or a Tagalog lawyer explain that. It roughly means, "Attorney, so you are indeed a lawyer?"

According to the Free Dictionary, an attorney is:

attorney (əˈtɜːnɪ)

n

1. (Law) a person legally appointed or empowered to act for another

2. (Law) US a lawyer qualified to represent clients in legal proceedings

3. (Professions) US a lawyer qualified to represent clients in legal proceedings

4. (Law) South African a solicitor

5. (Professions) South African a solicitor

I think Paras subscribed to the attorney-is-a-lawyer view. And he introduced a superfluous, if not conflicting, idea when discussing Article 784 of the Civil Code.

Here's the article from page 46 of Paras' book Civil Code of the Philippines Annotated, Vol. III, 2013 Edition:

 Here's his discussion on page 46 and 47:

Up to this point he has hewed to the common explanation of the article. And he should have stopped there. As Ruben F. Balane is prone to say, "he should have left well enough alone."

Alas, he added a further comment which brought to the fore his attorney-is-a-lawyer view:

The attorney in Article 784 is not necessarily a lawyer. The attorney here is the first definition of the word in the Free Dictionary as seen above.

Article 784 of the Philippine New Civil Code was lifted from Articulo 670 of the Codigo Civil:

El testamento es un acto personalísimo: no podrá dejarse su formación, en todo ni parte, al arbitrio de un tercero, ni hacerse por medio de comisario o mandatario.
          Tampoco podrá dejarse al arbitrio de un tercero la subsistencia del nombramiento de herederos o legatarios, ni la designación de las porciones en que hayan de suceder cuando sean instituidos nominalmente.

A comisario or a mandatario is not always a lawyer.