CHAPTER IX. 
THE PREDICATIVE INFINITIVE WITH DATIVE SUBJECT. 
The first to suggest that in the Germanic languages, specifically in Gothic, 
there occurs after an impersonal verb {wairpan) a dative with predicative in¬ 
finitive substantially identical with the -well-known accusative with predicative 
infinitive, was Jacob Grimm, w r ho, in his Deutsche Grammoiik, IV, p. 131, cited 
the following as an example in Gothic: Mark 2. 23: jah w>arp pairhgaggan 
imma pairh atisk = K al iyevero 7rap<nropevecr6aL avrov . . . Sta t£)v cnroplpmtv. To me 
the infinitive here seems subjective, not predicative, and the dative seems 
governed by the finite verb, not to be the subject of the infinitive; but not so 
to Grimm: “ Auf warp beziehen mag ich den Dat. nicht (etwa in dem Sinn: es 
geschah, begegnete ihm, dass), dann wiirde er unmittelbar daneben stefaem” 
Further discussion of this locution in Gothic is deferred to Chapter XVI, 
section ix; and the example is quoted here merely to define the idiom under 
discussion and, incidentally, to give a bit of its earliest history. 
For the moment accepting Grimm’s theory, have we such a dative-with- 
infinitive construction in Anglo-Saxon? True, Grimm says that not a trace 
of the idiom occurs in any other Germanic language besides Gothic: “ In 
keinem andern deutschen Dialect die Spur einer solchen Construction, wie sie 
auch im Goth, nur nach warp vorkommt.” 1 But I cannot see that the dative 
with infinitive in the following examples differs essentially from that in the 
Gothic sentence above quoted: — 
(1) Uninflected: 
Gosp.: Mk. 9.47: hetere &e is mid anum eagan gan on Godes rice = 9.46: 
bonum est tibi luscum introire in regnum Dei. — L. 12.12: Halig Gast eow 
Iserb on bsere tide ba bing be eow specan gebyraS = Spiritus enim sanctus docebit 
vos in ipsa hora quid oporteat vos dicere. — L. 15.32 a>b : 8e gebyrede gewist- 
fullian and geblissian = Epulari autem et gaudere oportebat. 2 — L. 24.26 a * b : 
Hu ne gebyrede Criste bas bing Soligean, and swa on his wuldor gan? = Nonne 
hsec oportuit pati Christum , et ita intrare in gloriam suam? — Pr. Gu. V. 67, 68, 
69: swa bonne gedafenaS &am men [Vercelli MS.: bane man] gelice burh six daga 
fsesten bone gast gefrcetwian, and bonne by seofoban dseg mete Sicgan and his 
lichaman restan — ita etiam hominem decet sex diebus per jejunii plasma spiritu 
reformari, et septimo die comedendo carni requiem dare. — L. 4.43 Soblice me 
gedafenad obrum ceastrum Godes rice bodian = Quia et aliis civitatibus oportet 
me evangelizare (may be accusative and infinitive). 
(2) Inflected: 
Mat. 19.24: ea<5elicre byS bam olfende to ganne burh nsedle eage, bonne se 
welega on heofona rice ga = facilius est camelum per foramen acus transire , 
quam divitem intrare in regnum coelorum. 3 — Mk. 10.25: EatSere ys olfende to 
farenne burh nasdle byrel = Facilius est camelum per foramen acus transire. 
1 Grimm, l. c., IV, p. 131. 
2 Cf. Tatian’s translation of the same passage, in Chapter XVI, section ix. 
3 Cf. Tatian’s translation of the same passage, in Chapter XVI, section viii. 
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