A Comparative Grammar of the Modern Aryan Languages of India v3.c17.155

v3.c17.155

It was seen above that in the old world verb there were six phases, and that two of these, the desiderative and intensive, have since been lost. The modern verb having to provide for active, neuter, passive, causal and other phases, has been obliged to have recourse to processes of its own, by which it arrives at the possession of a much wider range than Sanskrit can boast of, and does it too by far simpler means. Partly this result is obtained by ingenious adaptations of Prakrit forms, partly by modifications of, or additions to, its own stems, and partly by combining two stems together. It will first, therefore, be necessary to examine what phases the modern verb has, and then to proceed to examine the processes by which it has provided itself with the necessary forms for each phase.