ON THE TIME DENOTED BY THE TENSES OF THE INFINITIVE WHEN THEY ARE PRECEDED BY THE ARTICLE AND HAVE A SUBJECT EXPRESSED.

The able and instructive treatise of Madvig on the two uses of the Aorist Infinitive in Greek (in his Bemerkungen über einige Puncte der griechischen Wortfügungslehre, published as a supplement to his Syntax der griechischen Sprache) contains the earliest complete statement of the ordinary uses of that tense. The same principle, as far as it refers to indirect discourse, is clearly stated in Sophocles's Greek Grammar (published in the same year, 1847). But with these exceptions, no distinct statement had been made, either in elementary grammars or in more elaborate treatises, of the simple principle which distinguishes the use of the Aorist Infinitive in βούλεται ἐλθεῖν, he wishes to go, from that in φηαὶν ἐλθεῖν, he says that he went. According to Madvig, however, the use of the Aorist Infinitive as a past tense is not confined to indirect discourse, but extends also to cases in which the Infinitive “has a subject expressed and at the same time is preceded by the article.” This principle was too hastily adopted, on Madvig's high authority, in the first edition of the present work; and, as there seemed no good ground for distinguishing the Aorist from the Present Infinitive in similar construction, the general principle was stated, that any tense of the Infinitive could retain its designation of time (as in indirect discourse) when it had at the same time the article and a subject.