The Accusative With Infinitive, and Some Kindred Constructions in English (Classic Reprint)

Book excerpt: Excerpt from The Accusative With Infinitive, and Some Kindred Constructions in English In illustrating the development of so common a construo tion it was, Of course, inexpedient and unnecessary to make exhaustive citations from the texts examined. In the case of the more common and obvious phases, such as that of the active infinitive employed after verbs of causation and sense perception, only a few examples after any verb are given from Old English texts and the earliest occurrences from the Middle English texts examined, no illustration being given In any case after Chaucer. The passive infinitive after these verbs, as being more important, is illustrated more fully, but not exhaustively. For the rarer manifestations of the construction - after verbs of mental perception and declaration - all the occurrences in Old English are given either by quotation or by reference, while from the Middle English only as much is given as is required to indicate clearly the course of the development. This, it may be said, involves the citation of practically all occurrences except after such very common verbs as think and know. In Mod ern English the construction is illustrated only after verbs of mental perception and declaration. No more than one or two quotations from a writer are made after any parti onlar verb, references being given for other passages. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.