VOICE. 7. Voice is that form of the Verb by which we show whether the subject of the statement denotes the doer of the action, or the object of the action, expressed by the verb. 8. There are two Voices: the Active Voice, and the Passive Voice. (i) When a verb is used in the active voice, the subject of the sentence stands for the doer of the action. "He killed the mouse.' (ii) When a verb is in the passive voice, the subject of the sentence stands for the object of the action. "The mouse was killed." Or we may say that, in the passive voice the grammatical subject denotes the real object. (iii) There is in English a kind of middle voice. Thus we can say, "He opened the door" (active); "The door was opened" (passive); "The door opened" (middle). In the same way we have, "This wood cuts easily;" "Honey tastes sweet;" "The book sold well," etc. 9. An Intransitive Verb, as it can cannot be used in the passive voice. have no direct object, But, as we have seen, we can make an intransitive into a transitive verb by adding a preposition; and hence we can say :— ACTIVE. (a) They laughed at him. (a) The general spoke to him. PASSIVE. (b) He was laughed-at by them. 10. In changing a verb in the active voice into the passive, we may make either (i) the direct or (ii) the indirect object into the subject of the passive verb. The object after the passive verb is not the real object of that verb, for a passive verb cannot rightly take an object. It is left over, as it were, from the active verb, and is hence sometimes called a Residuary Object. 11. The passive voice of a verb is formed by using a part of the verb to be and the past participle of the verb. Thus I have been beaten. (i) Some intransitive verbs form their perfect tenses by means of the ""He is gone." verb to be and their past participle, as But the meaning here is quite different. done to the subject of the verb. 66 I am come;" There is no mark of anything (ii) Shakespeare has the phrases: is run; is arrived; are marched forth; is entered into; is stolen away. MOOD. 12. The Mood of a verb is the manner in which the statement made by the verb is presented to the mind. Is a statement made directly? Is a command given? Is a statement subjoined to another? All these are different moods or modes. There are four moods : the Indicative; the Imperative; the Subjunctive; and the Infinitive. (i) Indicative comes from the Lat. indicăre, to point out. (ii) Imperative comes from the Lat. imperare, to command. Hence also emperor, empress, etc. (through French). (iii) Subjunctive comes from Lat. subjungĕre, to join on to. (iv) Infinitive comes from Lat. infinitus, unlimited; because the verb in this mood is not limited by person, number, etc. 13. The Indicative Mood makes a direct assertion, or puts a question in a direct manner. "Is John ill?” Thus we say: "John is ill;" 14. The Imperative Mood is the mood of command, request, or entreaty. Thus we say: "Go!" "Give me the book, please;" 'Do come back!" (i) The Imperative Mood is the pure root of the verb without any inflexion. (ii) It has in reality only one person-the second. 15. The Subjunctive Mood is that form of the verb which is used in a sentence that is subjoined to a principal sentence, and which does not express a fact directly, but only the relation of a fact to the mind of the speaker. Most often it expresses both doubt and futurity. Thus we say: (i) "O that he were here!" (ii) "Love not sleep, lest thou come to poverty." (iii) "Whoever he be, he cannot be a good man." (i) In the first sentence, the person is not here. (ii) In the second, the person spoken to has not come to poverty; but he may. (iii) In the third, we do not know who the person really is. (iv) The Subjunctive Mood is rapidly dying out of use in modern English. 16. The Infinitive Mood is that form of the verb which has no reference to any agent, and is therefore unlimited by person, by number, or by time. It is the verb itself, pure and simple. (i) The preposition to is not an essential part nor a necessary sign of the infinitive. The oldest sign of it was the ending in an. After may, can, shall, will, must, bid, dare, do, let, make, hear, see, feel, need, the simple infinitive, without to, is still used. (ii) The Infinitive is really a noun, and it may be (a) either in the nominative or (b) in the obj. case. Thus we have: (a) "To err is human; to forgive, divine;" and (b) “I wish to go." (iii) In O.E. it was declined like any other noun; and the dative case ended in anne. Then to was placed before this dative, to indicate purpose. Thus we find, "The sower went out to sow," when, in O.E. to sow was to sawenne. This, which is now called the gerundial infinitive, has become very common in English. Thus we have, "I came to see you;" A house to let." "To hear him (= on hearing him) talk, you would think he was worth millions." (iv) We must be careful to distinguish between (a) the pure Infinitive and (b) the gerundial Infinitive. Thus we say (a) I want to see him. (b) I went to see him. The latter is the gerundial infinitive-that is, the old dative. (c) The gerundial infinitive is attached (1) to a noun; and (2) to an adjective. Thus we have such phrases as (1) Bread to eat; water to drink; a house to sell. (2) Wonderful to relate; quick to take offence; eager to go. 17. A Gerund is a noun formed from a verb by the addition of ing. It may be either (i) a subject; or (ii) an object; or (iii) it may be governed by a preposition. It has two functions: that of a noun, and that of a verb-that is, it is itself a noun, and it has the governing power of a verb. (i) Reading is pleasant. (ii) I like reading. (iii) He got off by crossing the river. In this last sentence, crossing is a noun in relation to by, and a verb in relation to river. Gerund comes from the Lat. gero, I carry on; because it carries on the power or function of the verb. (ii) The Gerund must be carefully distinguished from three other kinds of words: (a) from the verbal noun, which used to end in ung; (b) from the present participle; and (c) from the infinitive with to. The following are examples : (a) "Forty and six years was this temple in building." Here building is a verbal noun. (b) "Dreaming as he went along, he fell into the brook." Here dreaming is an adjective agreeing with he, and is therefore a participle. (a) "He was punished for robbing the orchard." Here robbing is a gerund, because it is a noun and also governs a noun. (b) "He was tired of dreaming such dreams. Here dreaming is a gerund, because it is a noun and governs a noun. (c) "He comes here to write his letters.' Here to write is the gerundial infinitive; it is in the dative case; and the O.E. form was to writanne. Here the to has a distinct meaning. This is the socalled "infinitive of purpose;" but it is a true gerund. In the seventeenth cen (c) "To write is quite easy, when one has a good pen.' Here to write is a present infinitive, and is the nominative to is. (It must not be forgotten that the oldest infinitive had no to, and that it still exists in this pure form in such lines as "Better dwell in the midst of alarms, than reigntury, when the sense of the to was weakin this horrible place." ened, it took a for,-"What went ye out for to see?" (iii) The following three words in ing have each a special function :— The 18. A Participle is a verbal adjective. There are two participles the Present Active and the Perfect Passive. former (i) has two functions: that of an adjective and that of a verb. The latter (ii) has only the function of an adjective. (i) “Hearing the noise, the porter ran to the gate." In this sentence, hearing is an adjective qualifying porter, and a verb governing noise. (ii) Defeated and discouraged, the enemy surrendered. 1. We must be very careful to distinguish between (a) the gerund in ing, and (b) the participle in ing. Thus running in a “running stream" is an adjective, and therefore a participle. In the phrase, "in running along," it is a noun, and therefore a gerund. Milton says— "And ever, against eating cares, Lap me in soft Lydian airs! !" Here eating is an adjective, and means fretting; and it is therefore a participle. But if it had meant cares about eating, eating would have been a noun, and therefore a gerund. So a fishing-rod is not a rod that fishes; a frying-pan is not a pan that fries; a walking-stick is not a stick that walks. The rod is a rod for fishing; the pan, a pan for frying; the stick, a stick for walking; and therefore fishing, frying, and walking are all gerunds. 2. The word participle comes from Lat. participāre, to partake of. The participle partakes of the nature of the verb. (Hence also participate.) TENSE. 19. Tense is the form which the verb takes to indicate time. There are, in human life, three times: past, present, and future. Hence there are in a verb three chief tenses: Past, Present, and Future. These may be represented on a straight line: (i) The word tense comes to us from the French temps, which is from the Lat. tempus, time. Hence also temporal, temporary, etc. (The modern French word is temps; the old French word was tens.) 20. The tenses of an English verb give not only the time of an action or event, but also the state or condition of that action or event. This state may be complete or incomplete, or neither—that is, it is left indefinite. These states are oftener called perfect, imperfect, and indefinite. The condition, then, of an action as expressed by a verb, or the condition of the tense of a verb, may be of three kinds. It may be (i) Complete or Perfect, as Written. Writing. Write. |