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Verbs come in many forms as we conjugate them and put them in the correct tense
Infinitives are an example of a verb form that isn’t used as a verb
You might be familiar with the concept of infinitives if you’ve studied a language other than
They don’t get as much attention in English grammar lessons, but you’re actually using them
We can’t fully understand infinitive verbals without knowing what a verbal is
When a verb form acts as a different part of speech, we call this a verbal
There are three types of verbals: participles, gerunds, and infinitives
Participles act as adjectives, and might use a past or present form
They’re more complicated than other verbals, so let’s start by defining them
It looks exactly the same as the simple present form of a verb
For example, some infinitive verbs include dance, climb, cook, run, and play
Conjugation is the act of changing a verb to fit the subject, tense, or mood
Often, an infinitive also has the word "to" in front of it, as in to dance, to
Infinitives are a type of non-finite verb, which means it will never be the main verb of
Finite verbs are verbs that can be conjugated and used as the main verb
Infinitive verbals function as other parts of speech instead of verbs
Without the "to" in front, infinitive verbs look just like the simple present tense of a verb,
The infinitive "to cook" acts like a noun because it is the answer to "what do you
I’ve always found it easier to understand infinitives in the context of learning other languages
If you have ever studied another language, the verbs you learn how to conjugate are infinitives
Neither are preceded by a subject; they follow other verbs that are conjugated
However, when you are looking up a verb in a dictionary, you are looking up an infinitive
We use infinitive phrases all the time, even if we aren’t aware of it!
There are several ways you can identify an infinitive verb in a sentence
A quick way to identify an infinitive is by looking for the word "to" in front of
In other words, if you replace it with one of those parts of speech, will the sentence
Bare infinitives can make identifying infinitives more complicated
A bare infinitive is an infinitive verb that does not use "to
These verbs include words like might, may, could, can, should, and will, to name a few
Sometimes, a bare infinitive follows another type of special verb
These other verbs are often sensing verbs, and they require a direct object before the infinitive
The special verb is in bold, the direct object is underlined, and the infinitive is highlighted
These special verbs can be conjugated, but it will still follow the format of special verb + direct
But what does this look like? Let's cover each of these in more detail
But infinitives can also act like the direct object after certain verbs
They can even act as a subject! Here are some examples where infinitives are functioning as nouns:
" We could even say, "Marriage was the only thing Kitty Bennet wanted
In the first example, the infinitive "to drink" modifies the noun "milk
Infinitives are often used as adverbs to explain how, when, why, how much, or where
In other words, the infinitive as an adverb provides more information about the verb it modifies
Here are some examples of infinitives that function as adverbs:
In the second example, the infinitive "to receive" is explaining why the man crashed his car
The same is true in the third sentence: "to show" modifies the verb "came
An infinitive phrase is a phrase that includes an infinitive, along with any other complements or modifiers
Be careful not to confuse an infinitive phrase with an adverbial phrase
When you insert a word or words between the "to" and the infinitive form of a verb,
Split infinitives are always a hotly debated topic in grammar
In prescriptive grammar, most consider the split infinitive to be grammatically incorrect
One of the most famous examples of a split infinitive comes from Star Trek
To be grammatically correct according to prescriptive grammar rules, the quote should be, "to go boldly where
If you split an infinitive, ProWritingAid can help point it out to you so you can decide
Otherwise, try to rearrange the infinitive phrase to remove the split infinitive
If it sounds incorrect or loses emphasis, leave the split infinitive
In this case, leaving the split infinitive "to more than double" is the better option
But if you are writing something very formal or technical, it’s probably best to remove the
Infinitives are one of those grammar elements that we use all the time but may not be