The Conditional in German. 69 



the conditional sentence is very frecjnently represented by the 

 temporal relation of the future. This relation of reason is 

 really at the same time a temporal relation, if it is a real one. 

 We therefore make a special use of these forms of the future, 

 whenever the possible reason ( the condition) is to be repre- 

 sented as a real one (not as a lofjjical one). Thus we say, 

 e. (J., Wenn er Wein getrunken haette, wuerde er berauscht 

 sein; wenn es warm waere, wuerde das Eis schmelzen, but 

 never Wenn er berauscht waere, wuerde er Wein getrunken 

 haben; Wenn das Eis schmoelze, wuerde es warm sein. The 

 real signification of the Conditional is the fact that it serves, 

 like every abrogative antithesis, to emphasize the thought pre- 

 sented. (Cf. Dr. K. F. Becker, Ausf. d. Gramm., II, p. 58 ff., 

 from whom most of this discussion is taken.) 



If we now compare the various significations of these modes 

 with those which obtained in the older languages, we shall see 

 that the germ of even the nicer shades of distinction existed 

 at that early day. The future forms also existed and are de- 

 scribed by Whitney, Skr. Gramm. Sec. 940 as follows: "From 

 the future-stem is made an augment-preterit, by prefixing the 

 augment and adding the secondary endings, in precisely the 

 same manner as an imperfect from a present-stem in a. This 

 preterite is called the conditional. 



"It stands related to the future, in form and meaning, as 

 the French conditional aurais to the future anrai, or as the 

 English would Jifive to ivill have — nearly as the German 

 wuerde hahen to icerde haben.'''' 



It is, however, the rarest of all forms of the Sanskrit verb, 

 the R.V. containing but one example, abharisyat, " was going to 

 carry off,'' and the later literature not many more. AVhitney 

 defines the Conditional thus: "The conditional would seem 

 to be most originally and properly used to signify that some- 

 thing 'was going to' be done. And this value it has in its only 

 Vedic occurrence, and occasionally elsewhere. But usually 

 it has the sense ordinarily called 'conditional'; and in the 

 great majority of its occurrences it is found ( like the sub- 

 junctive and optative, when used in the same value) in both 

 clauses of a conditional sentence. Thus, y6 vrtrdya sinam 



