Page:Sanskrit Grammar by Whitney p1.djvu/357

 (MBh.) he was filled with affection, and said to him;  (R.) he burned him with wood, and he became then a heavenly form.

928. The aorist of the older language has the value of a proper "perfect": that is, it signifies something past which is viewed as completed with reference to the present; and it requires accordingly to be rendered by our tense made with the auxiliary have. In general, it indicates what has just taken place; and oftenest something which the speaker has experienced.

a. Examples from the Veda are: (RV.) these here have led about a cow, they have carried around the fire, they have done honor to the gods — who shall venture anything against them?  (RV.) he whom we (formerly, impf.) sought with our mind has (now, aor.) come;  (RV.) that libation by which Indra, making it, became (impf.) of highest glory, I have now made, ye gods; I have become free from enemies.

b. Examples from the Brāhmaṇa language are: (ÇB.) ''she lived with him a long time. Then the Gandharvas said to one another, "this Urvaçī, forsooth, hath dwelt a long time among mortals"; (AB.) his teeth fell out. He said to him: "his teeth truly have fallen out"; (TS.) of Indra, when he had slain Vritra, the force and might went away into the earth, and became the herbs and plants; he ran to Prajāpati, saying: "my force and might, after slaying Vritra, have gone away into the earth, and have become the herbs and plants";  (AV., in prose passage) going up to him in person, let him say: "Vrātya, where hast thou abode"?  (ÇB.) if now two should come disputing with one another, [the one] saying "I have seen", [the other] "I have heard", we should believe the one who said "I have seen"''.

929. a. This distinction of the aorist from the imperfect and perfect as tenses of narration is very common in the BrāhmaṇalanguageBrāhmaṇa language [sic] (including the older Upanishads and the Sūtras), and is closely observed; violation of it is very rare, and is to be regarded as either due to corruption of text or indicative of a late origin.

b. In the Vedic hymns, the same distinction is prevalent, but is both less clear and less strictly maintained; many passages would admit an