98. Do you notice any difference in the two verbs in the following sentences:
- The boy found the ball.
- The earth is round.
In the sentence, The boy found the ball, the word ball tells what the boy found. The verb found expresses action; it tells what the boy does. Boy is the subject of the action—the one who performs the action. The word ball is the object of the action. It shows the receiver of the action. In the sentence, The earth is round, is does not express action. The earth is not doing anything, it simply is. The verb is expresses a state or condition and is incomplete, for you do not know what state or condition is expressed until we add the other word or words which describe the state or condition.
Notice the following sentences:
- The earth is round.
- The earth is our home.
- The earth is a sphere.
- The earth is large.
The words round, sphere, home and large, describe the earth which is the subject of the verb is.
99. So we have two classes of incomplete verbs, the verbs that express action and the verbs that express state or condition. The verbs which express action are called transitive verbs. Transitive is a word derived from the Latin, and means literally passing over.
100. So a transitive verb describes an action which passes over from the subject to the object. As for example in the sentence, The player struck the ball, struck is a transitive verb—a verb of action—describing the action of the subject, player, which passes over to the object, ball. Therefore we have our definition of a transitive verb:
A transitive verb is one that has a complement showing who or what receives the action expressed by the verb.
The complement or word that denotes the receiver of the action expressed by a transitive verb is called the object.