But the verbs have, will, shall, may, possess meanings of their own which are dropped when the words are used as auxiliaries. He will do it' may mean 'He is determined to do it,' as well as 'He is going to do it.' In the former case will is not an auxiliary, in the latter it is. Have signifies possess when I say 'I have a bicycle,' but it is merely auxiliary when I say 'I have lost my bicycle.' May means permission in 'You may try if you like;' it is auxiliary when we say 'You won't find out, though you may try your best.' Verbs which are used with a meaning of their own, and not merely as substitutes for inflexions in the conjugation of other verbs, are called Notional Verbs. 143. An Impersonal Verb is one in which the source of the action is not expressed. A true Impersonal Verb therefore has no subject. Only two examples of true Impersonals occur in modern English, methinks and meseems, and these belong to the diction of rhetoric rather than to every-day speech. Me is a dative case: hence it cannot be the subject. The meaning of the two Impersonals is the same, viz. 'It seems to me.' Thinks in methinks comes from the Old English thynkan, 'to seem,' which was a different verb from thencan, 'to think.' 'It rains,' 'it freezes,' and similar expressions are commonly called Impersonal, but they have a grammatical subject, it. If we are asked however, 'What rains?' 'What freezes?' we cannot specify the thing for which the it stands: the grammatical subject represents no real source of the action. QUESTIONS. 1. Write sentences to illustrate the transitive use of the following verbs:-'We are resting.'-'Don't push.'-'How you squeeze!''Forty feeding like one.'-'They are pressing for payment.'-' The shadows lengthen.'-'The days draw in.'-'Times change.'-' How it pours!''The meat will keep.'-'We mean to remove next spring.''The king recovered.' 2. Write sentences to show that the following verbs may be used both transitively and intransitively :-strike, shake, stop, roll, boil, survive, wake, burst, upset, grow. 3. Distinguish the terms Transitive, Intransitive, Active, Passive. State which of these terms you would apply to the verbs in the following sentences respectively, and point out any peculiarities of construction:-they are arrived, they ran a race, he overeats himself, the book is selling well, he swam the river, he lay down. 4. Refer to its class (as Transitive, Intransitive, Verb of Incomplete Predication, Impersonal, Notional or Auxiliary) each Verb in the following sentences:-'It will rain tomorrow.'-'I will do it my own way.'-'They will not succeed.'-'You may call if you like, but he may not be at home.' He feels his way.'-'He feels ill.'-‘The bonnet became a hat.'-'The bonnet became the lady.'-'You shall not go out.'-'We shall not go out.'-' He grows barley.'-' He grows stout.' 5. Give instances of verbs which can be used (1) both transitively and intransitively, (2) both as complete predicates and as incomplete. 141 CHAPTER XVI. INFLEXIONS OF VERBS. 144. VERBS undergo changes of form to mark differences of Voice, Mood, Tense, Number, Person. As inflexions have almost entirely disappeared from English verbs, we have recourse to auxiliary verbs and pronouns to express these differences. Amaverimus, amabimur are inflexions of the Latin verb amo: we shall have loved, we shall be loved, their English equivalents, are not inflexions of the verb love; the required changes in the meaning of the verb are effected by the use of auxiliaries. Amo has over a hundred of these inflexions: love has seven, viz., love, lovest, loves, loveth, loved, lovedst, loving, and of these seven, the three forms lovest, loveth, lovedst, are no longer employed in ordinary speech. Voice is the form of a verb which shows whether the subject of the sentence stands for the doer or for the object of the action expressed by the verb. Mood is the form of a verb which shows the mode or manner in which the action is represented. Tense is the form of a verb which shows the time at which the action is represented as occur ring and the completeness or incompleteness of the action. Number is the form of a verb which shows whether we are speaking of one thing or of more than one. Person is the form of a verb which shows whether the subject of the sentence stands for the speaker, for the person addressed, or for some other thing. We shall treat of these modifications of the verb in order. 145. I. Voice. In English there are two Voices, an Active and a Passive Voice. The Active Voice is that form of a verb which shows that the subject of the sentence stands for the doer of the action expressed by the verb. The Passive Voice is that form of a verb which shows that the subject of the sentence stands for the object of the action expressed by the verb. Thus in 'Brutus stabbed Caesar,' Brutus, the subject of the sentence, represents the doer or agent of the act of stabbing expressed by the verb: stabbed is in the active voice. In 'Caesar was stabbed by Brutus,' Caesar, the subject of the sentence, represents the object or recipient of the act of stabbing: was stabbed is in the passive voice. Now as the subject of the sentence, when the verb is in the passive, stands for the object or receiver of the action, it is clear that, unless the action denoted by the verb passes on to some object, the passive construction will be impossible. Accordingly, only Transitive verbs admit of a passive use. The parts of the auxiliary verb be are used with the perfect participle of a transitive verb to form the passive voice: 'I am injured,' 'You were beaten,' 'He is captured,' 'They will be assisted,' 'We have been turned out.' 146. The reader may easily be misled by such forms as 'I am come,' 'You are arrived,' 'He is gone,' 'They are fallen,' in which the verbs are intransitive, and their perfect. tenses therefore are not passive, though they look as if they were. In 'I am injured,' 'You were beaten,' the participles injured and beaten are passive: in 'I am come,' 'You are arrived,' the participles come and arrived are active. There is a slight difference of meaning between the forms 'He is arrived,' 'He is gone' and 'He has arrived,' 'He has gone.' 'He has gone' lays stress on the action, 'He is gone' calls attention to the fact that he continues in a certain state, namely that of absence. We can say 'He has come and gone,' but not 'He is come and gone,' as is becomes unsuitable in connexion with come, when he no longer continues here, but is gone. 147. Verbs which take a double object admit of two forms of passive construction according as one object or the other is made the subject of the passive verb. A few illustrations will make this clear. Active. He told me a story. You granted him permission. They awarded him a prize. { { Passive. A story was told me by him. Permission was granted him by you. A prize was awarded him by them. The reader may construct further illustrations for himself, using the verbs promise, ask, refuse, show, offer, forgive, for the purpose. |