Owen—Relations Expressed by the Passive Voice. 125 
cedure that I find myself unable to antagonize them even ra¬ 
tionally. 
Dealing then with only what materials I surely have, and 
as I seem to have them, I observe that—given in the active 
form of thought the act of building, the relation of the action 
to its own actee, and the house—if I reverse this trio, I obtain 
the house, the relation of actee to its own action (the one with 
which the said actee is properly associated) and the action. In 
the expression of all this, as in the active voice so also in the 
passive, as it seems to me, relation is incorporated in the mean¬ 
ing of the verb which names the action. That is, in “maison 
6tre batie,” “domum aedificari” (a house to be built”), it is 
by what distinguishes the verbal form as passive that I find 
the relation of actee to its own action indicated.* 
In this case then the passive is the passive of the active voice. 
It is only such, however, as a consequence of having, like the 
active, overlooked the actor, abrogating like the active much of 
its prerogative and interest. 
Case III— When Used Without a Subject 
In the absence of the subject of the passive voice—in other 
words, the actee-—the only elements immediately offered for 
construction of a thought appear at first to be the action and 
the actor, known as “agent,” (subject of the active voice) ; and 
Ihey are not enough. But, posing as the terms of thought, 
they readily suggest appropriate relation, as required for 
thought completeness. 
To illustrate, the occurrence, in the active voice recorded by 
the sentence “Omnes eunt,” is reflected in the mind at first, I 
power—or that, I much suspect, of any one. To clearly pose the 
horse as drinking, I must sense the drinking individually, in no 
coalescence with the causing—also if I wish to pose the drinking as a 
drinking of the water; and, if I would pose the king as only causing, 
and not drinking, I had better sense that causing in no coalescence 
with the drinking; for, so long as drinking blends with causing, I am 
powerless to forestall misunderstanding—scandal. The horse may 
have the King’s nose in the trough in spite of me. 
* Indeed I do not know where else to find it. Order has no value; 
nor has noun-inflection. 
