Plain English. Marian Wharton
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137. The perfect time forms also have a progressive form. There is a difference of meaning in the present perfect and its progressive form. You say for instance, I have tried all my life to be free. You mean you have tried until the present time and the inference is that now you have ceased to try. But, if you say, I have been trying all my life to be free, we understand that you have tried and are still trying.
138. So we have the present perfect progressive which describes an action which progressed in the past and continued up to the present time. It is formed by using the present perfect form of the verb be and the present participle.
139. The past perfect progressive describes an action which was continuing or progressing at some past time. It is formed by using the past perfect time form of the verb be and the present participle.
140. The future perfect progressive describes an action which will be progressing at some future time. It is formed by using the future perfect time form of the verb be and the present participle.
Exercise 1
In the following sentences mark all the progressive forms, and note whether they are present, past, future, present perfect, past perfect or future perfect.
1. The old order is passing.
2. Men will be struggling for freedom so long as slavery exists.
3. The class struggle has been growing more intense as wealth has accumulated.
4. The workers are realizing their power.
5. He had been talking for an hour when we arrived.
6. Next Monday I shall have been working for one year.
7. The workers will be paying interest on war debts for generations to come unless they repudiate.
8. While Marx was writing his books, he lived in abject poverty.
9. The Industrial Relations Commission has been investigating industrial conditions.
10. Ferrer was martyred because the Modern Schools were educating the people.
11. The nations of Europe had been preparing for war for many years.
ACTIVE AND PASSIVE
141. Notice carefully the following sentences; select the subjects in these sentences which show who or what performed the action; select the subjects that show who or what receives the action. Do you notice any difference in the meaning of these sentences? Do you notice any difference in their form?
The engine struck the man.
The man was struck by the engine.
The system enslaves men.
Men are enslaved by the system.
Leaders often betray the people.
The people are often betrayed by leaders.
Let us look carefully at the first two sentences. You remember when we studied transitive verbs we found that every transitive verb had an object which was the receiver of the action expressed in the verb. Now you notice in this first sentence, The engine struck the man, we have the transitive verb struck. Engine is the subject of the verb and man is the object of the verb, the receiver of the action expressed by the verb struck.
Now in the sentence, The man was struck by the engine, we have the same thought expressed but in a different manner. The word man, which was the object of the verb struck in the first sentence, has now become the subject of the sentence, and we have changed our verb form from struck to was struck. In the first sentence of the subject, engine was the actor. In the second sentence, The man was struck by the engine, the subject of the sentence, man, is the receiver of the action expressed in the verb.
142. So we have thus changed the verb form from struck to was struck to indicate that the subject of the verb is the receiver of the action. Struck is called the active form of the verb because the subject of the verb is the actor. Was struck is called the passive form of the verb because the subject receives the action. Passive means receiving. In the passive form the subject is the receiver of the action expressed in the verb.
143. You remember that complete verbs have no object or complement, therefore it would follow that they cannot be put in the passive form for there is no object to become the receiver of the action. Take the complete verb, sleep, for example. We do not sleep anything, hence sleep has no passive form for there is no object which can be used as the subject, the receiver of the action.
Only transitive verbs can be put into the passive form. Remember that a transitive verb in the passive form is one that represents its subject as receiving the action.
The present, past, future and all the perfect time forms of transitive verbs can be changed from active to passive. The progressive time forms can be changed into the passive, but it makes an awkward construction and should be avoided as much as possible. Occasionally, however, we find it worth our while to use these forms, as for example:
The book is being written by the man.
This is the passive form of the present progressive, The man is writing a book.
The book was being written by the man.
This is the passive form of the past progressive, The man was writing the book.
144. The future progressive passive is awkward, and the present and past progressive forms are the only forms we find used in the passive. The best writers use them sparingly for we can usually say the same thing by using the active form of the verb and have a sentence which sounds much better.
Exercise 2
All the verbs in the following sentences are transitive verbs in the active form. Rewrite each sentence, putting the verb into the passive form and making the object of the active verb the subject of the passive verb; as, for example, the first sentence should be rewritten as follows:
War on Russia was declared by Germany on August 1, 1914.
1. Germany declared war on Russia, August 1, 1914.
2. Who will sign the Emancipation Proclamation of the Proletariat?
3. Marx and Engels wrote the Communist Manifesto.
4. Spain murdered Francisco Ferrer, October 13, 1909.
5. We celebrate the first of May as International Labor Day.
6. The people of Paris stormed the Bastille, July 14, 1789.
7. Wat Tyler was leading the English workers in rebellion against the King when the Mayor of London stabbed him in 1381.
8. The Inquisition burned Bruno at the stake for heresy in 1600.
9. The Paris Commune followed the German siege of Paris in 1871.
SUMMARY
145. Now let us take the verb see and name all the time forms which we can describe with the changes in the verb forms which we have learned to make and also with the verb phrases which we can construct with the help of the verbs, be, have, shall and will.
First, we want to express the present, what is happening now, and we want to put it in both the active and passive forms, so we say: