Page:Sanskrit Grammar by Whitney p1.djvu/324

 narration of facts not witnessed by the narrator; but there is no evidence of its being either exclusively or distinctively so employed at any period.

b. In the later language, it is simply a preterit or past tense, equivalent with the imperfect, and freely interchangeable or coördinated with it. It is on the whole less common than the imperfect, although the preferences of different authors are diverse, and it sometimes exceeds the imperfect in frequency (compare (927).

c. The perfects and  are everywhere used with present value. In the Brāhmaṇas, also others, especially, also , , etc.

822. In the Brāhmaṇas, the distinction of tense-value between perfect and imperfect is almost altogether lost, as in the later language. But in most of the texts the imperfect is the ordinary tense of narration, the perfect being only exceptionally used. Thus in PB., the imperfects are to the perfects as more than a hundred to one; in the Brāhmaṇa parts of TS. and TB., as over thirty-four to one; and in those of MS. in about the same proportion; in AB., as more than four to one, the perfect appearing mostly in certain passages, where it takes the place of imperfect. It is only in ÇB. that the perfect is much more commonly used, and even, to a considerable extent, in coördination with the imperfect. Throughout the Brāhmaṇas, however, the perfect participles have in general the true "perfect" value, indicating a completed or proximate past.

823. In the Veda, the case is very different. The perfect is used as past tense in narration, but only rarely; sometimes also it has a true "perfect" sense, or signifies a completed or proximate past (like the aorist of the older language: 928); but oftenest it has a value hardly or not at all distinguishable in point of time from the present. It is thus the equivalent of imperfect, aorist, and present; and it occurs coördinated with them all.

a. Examples are: of perfect with present, (RV.) they weary not nor stop, they fly like birds;  (RV.) he in truth rules king of men; he embraces them all, as the wheel the spokes; — of perfect with aorist,  (RV.) she is come beaming like a young maiden; Agni hath appeared for the kindling of mortals; she hath made light, driving away the darkness; — of perfect with imperfect,  (RV.) he slew the dragon, he penetrated to the waters. Such a coordination as this last is of constant occurrence in the later language: e. g. (R.) he was glad, and paid honor to her;  (MBh.) she took hold of the end of his garment, and dropped a garland on his shoulders.