MacDonnell II - Wilbourhall.org

215]IMPERATIVE 349brutat tell her : come io me as I stand here ; when she hascome, you shall (then) tell it us (SB.). As this form is onlyactive, the subj. takes its place in middle verbs thus tarn;vrnisva = do thou choose H (now) as opposed to tarn vrnasaichoose it then (SB.).n, Tlie genuine impv. seems never to be found in negative sentences;thus it never appears in V. witli the prohibitive particle mawhich is used with injunctive forms only, and in B. almost exclusivelywith the aor. in.j.).It is employed in positive principal clausesonly e. ; g. v{ no dhehi ydtha jivama so dispose us that ice may live (SB.).A subordinate clause with ind,, subj., or (very rarely) opt. may precedeor follow e. ; g. y£s tvam dutam saparySti, tfisya sma pravitabhava be the promoter of him ivlio adores thee as a messenger (i. 12^); samvidusa naya yo anusasati hring us . . together with one who knows, whomay give us directions (vi. .54^)id£m me; haryata v^co y^sya tSrematdrasa sat&m liimah gladly accept this word of mine by the force of ichich wen-otdd pass a hundred nmiters (v. 54^^). In such periods the form withtad would regularly be used in B.0. The RV. has a niimber of 2. sing, forms made with si addeddirectly to the root, which are clearly used imperatively, as is indicatedby their being generally accompanied by imperatives (sometimes bysubjunctives and imperatives) ; e.g. a dev^bhir yahi ydksi ca comewith the gods and sacrifice (i. 14'). These forms are confined to the RV.and passages borrowed from it) except satsi (AV. vi. 110^); and theyare restricted to positive principal sentences.B. Injunctive.Formally this mood corresponds to an unaugmented pasttense (including the 2. 3. du. and 2. pi. as represented byact, bhavatam, bhavatam, bhavata : mid. bhavetham,bhavetam, bhavadhvam, which later came to be regardedas imperatives). Its use constitutes one of the chiefdifficulties of Vedic grammar and interpretation,because itcannot always be distinguished from the subjunctive (e. g.gamat might be the subj. of a-gan or the inj. of a-gamat)or from an unaugmented indicative (e. g. carah might be =a-carah). Judged by its uses the inj. probably representsa very primitive verbal form which originally expressed anaction irrespective of tense or mood, the context showing