Page:The history of the Bengali language (1920).pdf/306

284 that lost language which gave rise to the dialects (now languages) in which ইব is now used. How in a far-fetched way ইব has to be extracted from তব্য to make it a future-denoting suffix, and how in accepting the theory to be correct, we have to accept the situation that the idiomatic use of the past time was wholly ignored in some modern vernaculars, have been sufficiently discussed. We have seen, on the other hand, in our analysis of the forms of verbs in the imperative mood, that such a form as করহ (do immediately now) was naturally reduced to করিহ and then to করিঅ or করিও to denote a command relating to doing in future; that this naturally evolved suffix ইও, easily transmutable to ইব, could be taken up for use as a future-forming suffix, without violating the idiomatic use of the past time, is, in my opinion, sufficiently clear.

It is not true, what is generally supposed to be the case, that most of the Bengali verbs require the help of the verbs of 'ভূ' and 'কৃ' origin to express their action. We can easily notice that the verbs in the old Māgadhi speech did not stand in need of any additional support from other verbs as auxiliaries; it is equally clear that our genuine Bengali verbs 'খাওয়া,' 'চলা,' 'শোওয়া,' etc., do not require the verbs of 'ভূ' or 'কৃ' origin to come to their help in expressing their own action. When in consequence of Sanskrit renaissance, our Bengali verbs were looked down upon as inelegant and vulgar, the Sanskrit verbal nouns were formed according to the rules of Sanskrit grammar, and a new method of expression being devised, the verbal nouns were made to be governed by the verbs of 'ভূ' or 'কৃ' origin. খাইতেছি, চলিবে, শুইল are the natural and genuine Bengali forms, while ভোজন করিতেছি, গমন করিবে, শয়ন করিল are unnatural Sanskritie forms. The influence of the Pandits became so very much dominating, that some verbs