A Grammar of the English Tongue - ESL Teachers Board

A Grammar of the English Tongue 42proper and elegant, as The book is written, is better than The book is wrote.Wrote however may be used in poetry; at least, if we allow any authority topoets, who, in the exultation of genius, think themselves perhaps entitled totrample on grammarians.There are other anomalies in the preterit.1. Win, spin, begin, swim, strike, stick, sing, sting, fling, ring, wring,spring, swing, drink, sink, shrink, stink, come, run, find, bind, grind, wind,both in the preterit imperfect and participle passive, give won, spun, begun,swum, struck, stuck, sung, stung, flung, rung, wrung, sprung, swung, drunk,sunk, shrunk, stunk, come, run, found, bound, ground, wound. And most ofthem are also formed in the preterit by a, as began, sang, rang, sprang,drank, came, ran, and some others; but most of these are now obsolete.Some in the participle passive likewise take en, as stricken, strucken,drunken, bounden.2. Fight, teach, reach, seek, beseech, catch, buy, bring, think, work, makefought, taught, raught, sought, besought, caught, bought, brought, thought,wrought.But a great many of these retain likewise the regular form, as teached,reached, beseeched, catched, worked.3. Take, shake, forsake, wake, awake, stand, break, speak, bear, shear,swear, tear, wear, weave, cleave, strive, thrive, drive, shine, rise, arise,smite, write, bide, abide, ride, choose, chuse, tread, get, beget, forget,seethe, make in both preterit and participle took, shook, forsook, woke,awoke, stood, broke, spoke, bore, shore, swore, tore, wore, wove, clove,strove, throve, drove, shone, rose, arose, smote, wrote, bode, abode, rode,chose, trode, got, begot, forgot, sod. But we say likewise, thrive, rise, smit,writ, abid, rid. In the preterit some are likewise formed by a, as brake,spake, bare, share, sware, tare, ware, clave, gat, begat, forgat, and perhapssome others, but more rarely. In the participle passive many of them areformed by en, as taken, shaken, forsaken, broken, spoken, born, shorn,sworn, torn, worn, woven, cloven, thriven, driven, risen, smitten, ridden,