Little as the distinction of voice is expressed in the nomen actionis, it is equally little inherent in the infinite. In such a sentence as I gave him a good beating, the meaning of beating is active; in the sentence He got a good beating, it is decidedly passive. Similarly, in such a sentence as I can read, the infinitive is active, but this is owing to the context: for instance, in such a sentence as This is not easy to read, it is clearly passive. Yet no one would call these phrases ambiguous. We can therefore easily imagine that infinitives may have existed long before they were differentiated into separate forms to mark the two voices. We still employ many infinitives which might be called neuter, neither active nor passive: such as, for instance, ‘Is it better to say yes or to say no?’ ‘fair to see;’ ‘a marvel to tell.’
In Gothic, however, we find many instances of infinitives which, being commonly employed as actives, are conveniently considered as belonging to that particular voice; but which, in special sentences, have a very clearly defined passive sense. Thus, qêmun ðan môtarjôs daupjan = Came then publicans (to) baptise = to be baptised (Luke iii. 12); Untê sunus mans skulds ist atgiban in handuns mannê = For (the) son (of) man due is (= must) deliver into hands (of) men = shall be delivered into. (Luke ix. 44); Varð ðan gasviltan ðamma unlêdin jah briggan fram aggilum in barma Abrahamis = (It) happened then (to) die (to) the beggar and (to) bring from (= by) angels into (the) bosom (of) Abraham = It came to pass that the beggar died and was carried, etc. (Luke xvi. 22); du saihvan = to see = for being seen (Matt. vi. 1), etc.
Though, then, in these and similar cases we find infinitive forms with unquestionably passive meanings, it would not be quite correct to assign them in formal grammar to the passive voice.
A grammatical passive is only acknowledged in cases where that passive has been formed from the same stem as the active, and has been marked off from it by a special method of formation, as in such cases as amo, ‘I love,’ amor, ‘I am loved.’ The relation of an intransitive verb to its corresponding causative, resembles that of a passive to its active, as in such cases as to fall, to fell; to drink, to drench; to sit, to set: and the pairs from roots etymologically unrelated, to make, to become; to kill, to die. In the case of the intransitive verbs, however, as compared with that of the grammatical passive, we do not dwell so much in thought upon an operating cause as constituting the difference between active and passive. But this distinction is so slight, that we actually find intransitive verbs used with a sequence such as we should expect after a passive, as in He died by the hand of the public executioner; He fell by his own ambition. On the other hand, we can see the transition from the passive to the active in the case of the Russian—where the active form is employed to express a passive sense,—and of the so-called deponent verbs. We have to translate a form like the Latin verti by ‘to turn,’ employing the middle voice. A case like Jam homo in mercaturâ vortitur, ‘The man is now busy with merchandise’ (Plautus, Mostellaria, III. i. 109) may serve to show how nearly allied is the middle or passive voice to the deponent proper. No doubt a true deponent differs from a verb used in the middle voice, by the fact that the deponent takes an accusative after it; but how nearly the two touch one another, may be gathered from such instances as that given above, by the side of adversari regem (Tac., Hist., iv. 84,), ‘to oppose, or to oppose one’s-self to, the king.’
One of the most common ways, in which the passive takes its origin, is from the middle voice, which is sometimes seen to be formed from the composition of the active with the reflective pronoun. We have in English two examples of this method of formation, in the words (to) bask and (to) busk: to bask means ‘to bathe one’s-self;’ to busk, ‘to prepare one’s-self,’ or ‘get ready.’[158] The sk stands for sik, as it appears in Icelandic, the accusative case of a reflective pronoun of the third person. The Russian often, in like manner, employs a reflective form in -sya instead of the passive, just as does the French; thus, Tavárni prodáutsya, les hardes se vendent, ‘The goods are sold,’ lit. ‘sell themselves:’ cf. Rien ne s’y voyait plus, pas même des débris (De Vigny).[159] ‘Nothing more was to be seen, not even the ruined remains.’
In these cases, one element of the signification of the middle voice is discarded. The middle voice denotes that an action starts from a person, and returns to him. In I strike myself the action ‘strikes’ starts from the speaker, but visits him again with its effects; in I am struck the action is visited upon the subject, but does not originate therewith. There are some reflective combinations, even in English, where the consciousness of the activity of the subject has practically disappeared: as in How do you find yourself? I bethought me; He found himself in an awkward position: but these, it will be seen, approach more to the use of the simple intransitive, by means of the relationship which this bears to the passive; cf. s’exciter with être excité; ‘to be excited:’ moveri, with se movere, ‘to move.’ There are certain uses of the verb, in French and German, in which the operation of the subject is almost effaced: as, sich befinden, in Wie befinden sie sich (‘How are you?’); cela se laisse dire (‘that may be said’).
CHAPTER XVI.
DISPLACEMENT OF THE SYNTACTICAL DISTRIBUTION.
The reader who remembers and fully apprehends the wider meaning, which in Chapter VI. we assigned to the terms (Psychological) ‘subject’ and ‘predicate,’ must realise how comparatively seldom the grammatical categories of the same name coincide with the corresponding parts of the thought to which the sentence is to give utterance. We defined the subject as the expression for that which the speaker presupposes known to the hearer, and the predicate as that which indicates what he wishes the hearer to think or learn about it. Hence, as we saw, the sentence theoretically consists of two parts; but, as each of these parts may be extended, we get—if we indicate subject and predicate by the letters S and P respectively, and the extensions by a, b, c, etc.—the following scheme for a simple sentence: Sabc + Pdef.
Now, in such a sentence, the grammatical subject, with all its extensions, will correspond with the psychological subject, and the grammatical predicate and its extensions with the psychological predicate, only in case the extensions of the subject are really no more than additions made in order to specify the known or presupposed, and if the predicate contains nothing which serves any further purpose than to convey the thought about that subject. But as soon as to the subject-noun, for instance, an adjective is added which conveys new thought about the subject; or, again, as soon as the object is indicated by a noun accompanied by a similar ‘additional’ qualification, then these additions or extensions become ipso facto psychological predicates, and the sentence, grammatically simple, becomes a psychologically complex one. Thus, suppose a good Charles and a wicked Charles have been spoken of, and the latter is known to have done something with his thick stick to the speaker; then, and then only, can a sentence like The wicked Charles has beaten me with his thick stick be a psychologically simple one. In this sentence then, The wicked Charles is subject, has beaten is predicate, and with his stick extension, and the psychological and grammatical divisions coincide completely. But suppose that it was known that the same person had beaten the speaker, but that the instrument was not known; or that the action and the instrument were known, but not the recipient of the blows: in this case the sentence, though remaining a simple one, would at once cease to correspond in its grammatical parts to the psychological divisions of (a) Charles has beaten me (subject) + with his stick (predicate), or, (b) Charles has beaten with his stick (subject) + me (predicate). In fact, if we wished to make the grammatical form correspond to the divisions of that psychologically simple statement, we should have to adopt a form grammatically complex; such as The instrument with which Charles has beaten me is his thick stick, or, The person whom Charles has beaten with his thick stick is I, according to the circumstances of the case.