NOTE. In the foregoing tenses, this verb is used either as a principal verb or as an auxiliary. INFINITIVE MODE.-Present Tense, To have. Perfect Tense, To have had. Present Participle, Having. Past or Perfect, Had. Compound Perfect, Having had. The words did, hast, hath, has, had, shalt, wilt, are evidently, as WALLIS observes, contracted for doed, havest, haveth, haves, haved, shallst, willst. THE VERB SUBSTANTIVE. § 346. The VERB SUBSTANTIVE is made up of three different verbs, each of which is defective in some of its parts, namely, Was, be, am. The parts which are defective in one verb are supplied by the inflections of one of the others. I. WAS is defective, except in the preterit tense, where it is found both in the indicative and the subjunctive. In the older stages of the Gothic languages the word has both a full conjugation and a regular one. In the Anglo-Saxon it has an infinitive, a participle present, and a participle past. In Maso-Gothic it is inflected throughout with s; as, Visa, vas, vêsum, visans. In that language it has the power of the Latin maneo=to remain. II. BE is inflected, in Anglo-Saxon, throughout the present tense, both indicative and subjunctive; found, also, as an infinitive, béon ; as a gerund, to beonne; and as a participle, beonde. The ancient form was as follows: It is stated by GRIMM, D. C., i., 1051, that the Anglo-Saxon forms beó, bist, bið, beoð, or beó, have not a present, but a future sense; that while am means I am, beó means I shall be; and that in the older languages, it is only where the form am is not found that be has the power of a present form. If we consider the word beon, like the word weoran (see below), to mean not so much to be as to become, we get an element of futurity; and from the idea of futurity we get the idea of contingency, and this explains the subjunctive power of be. III. AM. The m is no part of the original word, but only a sign of the first person, just as it is in all the Indo-European languages. Am, art, are, and is, are not, like am and was, parts of different words, but forms of one and the same word. 1. The substantive verb is used, 1st. As an auxiliary in the passive voice. 2d. As a copula, in connecting the predicate of a proposition with the subject. 3d. In predicating pure or absolute existence; as, God is; that is, God exists. In the following example it is used in each of the last two senses: We believe that thou art, and that thou art the rewarder of them who diligently seek thee." It was called by the Latins the substantive verb, in distinction from verbs which, besides the copula, contain in themselves an attribute, and which are called adjective verbs. See § 319. 2. This verb differs so much from other verbs that it is separated from them by some grammarians, and classed with relational words, as if its office were merely to indicate a relation, viz., that of the predicative adjective or substantive to the subject, or else those of mode, time, and personality. See § 318. IV. WORTH is a fragment of the Anglo-Saxon weorðan, to be, or to become. "Much wo worth the man that misruleth his inwitte! And well worth Piers Plowman that pursueth God in his going." PIERS PLOWMAN. "Woe worth the chase, woe worth the day, That cost thy life, my gallant gray."-Lady of the Lake. "Thus saith the Lord God, Howl ye and say, woe worth the day.'"-Ezekiel, xxx., 2. Several other verbs, such as to become, to grow, are nearly allied to substantive verbs. 2. Thou hast been (you have been). 2. Ye or you have been. 2. Thou hadst been (you had been). 2. Ye or you had been. Future Perfect Tense (Predictive). Singular. 1. I shall have been. 2. Thou wilt have been (you will have been). 3. He will have been. Plural. 1. We shall have been. 3. They will have been. Future Perfect Tense (Promissive). |