Growth of Analytical Forms and New Grammatical. Categories of the Verbals

§ 523. The development of analytical forms and new grammatical categories has transformed not only the finite verb but also the verbals.

Compound forms of the infinitive appeared at a very early date: the Pass. Inf., consisting of bēon plus Part. II, is found in OE texts, though its semantic contrast to the simple form is not consistent, since the OE Active Inf., despite its form, could sometimes have a passive meaning. Cf.:

hwelce pā hæpnan ʒodas sindon tō weorpianne (’which heathen gods were to be worshipped’) — active form, passive meaning

Sceolde witedōm bēon ʒefyllod.

(‘The prophesy should be fulfilled.’) — passive form and meaning.

In ME texts we find different types of compound Inf.: the Pass. Inf., the Perf. Inf. in the Active and Pass. forms, e. g.

pey bep to ben blamed eft parfore (c. 1300)

(‘they are to be blamed for that again’)

He moste han knowen love and his servyse

And been a feestlych man as fressh as May. (Chaucer)

(‘He must have known love and its service and (must have) been a jolly man, as fresh as May.’)

The wordes of the phisiciens ne sholde nat hart been understonden in thys wise. (Chaucer)

(‘The words of the physicians should not have been understood in this way.’)

In the texts of the 16th and 17th c. we find the same compound forms of the Inf. and also new Cont. and Perf. Cont. forms, e. g.

... first to correct him for grave Cicero, and not for scurril Plautus whom he confesses to have been reacting not long before. (J. Milton)

Evidently in the 17th c. the Inf. had the same set of forms as it has in present-day English.

§ 524. The analytical forms of Part, I began to develop later than the forms of the Inf. It was not until the 15th c. that the first compound forms are found in the records:

The seid Duke of Suffolk being most trostid with you... (Paston Letters)

(‘The said Duke of Suffolk being most trusted by you.’)

In the 17th c. Part. I is already used in all the four forms which it can build today: Perf. and non-Perf., Pass. and Active, e. g.:

Now I must take leave of our common mother, the earth, so worthily called in respect of her great merits of us; for she receiveth us being born, she feeds and clotheth us brought forth, and lastly, as forsaken whol­ly of nature, she receiveth us into her lap and covers us. (Peacham, 17th c.)

Julius Caesar, having spent the whole day in the field about his mil­itary affairs, divided the night also for three several uses... (Peacham)

The forms of Part. I made a balanced system: Pass. versus Active Perf. versus non-Perf. Part. II remained outside this system, correlated to the forms of Part. I through formal differences and certain semantic affinities and oppositions (see forsaken and brought in the examples above and Table 10 below).

§ 525. Compound forms of the - ing- form used in the functions of a noun, that is the Gerund, were the last to appear. The earliest in­stances of analytical forms of the Gerund are found in the age of the Lit­erary Renaissance, —when the Inf. and Part. I possessed already a com­plete set of compound forms. The formal pattern set by the Part. was repeated in the new forms of the Gerund. The following quotations il­lustrate compound forms of the Gerund in the texts of the 17th and 18th c.:

To let him spend his time no more at home,

Which would be great impeachment to his age

In having known no travel in his youth. (Shakespeare)

Yet afraid they were, it seemed: for presently the doors had their wooden ribs crushed in pieces by being beaten together. (Th. Dekker, early 17th c.)

This man, after having been long buffeted by adversity, went abroad. (Smollett, 18th c.)

§ 526. The formal distinctions which had developed in the system of the verbals towards the 17th and 18th c. are practically the same as in Mod E. The forms of the Inf. and the -ing- form (Part. I and Gerund) make up grammatical categories similar to those of the finite verb: Voice, Time-Correlation and Aspect. It may be assumed that the rela­tions between the members of these grammatical categories in the ver­bals roughly corresponded to those of the finite forms, both semanti­cally and formally. It should be noted though that sometimes the se­mantic oppositions were less strict or, perhaps, they were more often neutralised. For instance, the Active Inf. could still express a passive meaning:

His noble free offers left us nothing to aske. (Bacon, 17th c.)

(See OE examples in § 523.)

The non-Perf. forms in many contexts acquired the meaning of the perfect form, e. g.:

And so, giving her sufficient means and money, for his own reputa­tion sake, to rid her from Bristol and ship her for London, on his wife he bestowed all those jewels (Dekker) (giving is equivalent here to hav­ing given).