Unit 12: The Infinitive
Pictured Words
New Words
| 1. birds
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| 2. feathers
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| 3. stones
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| 4. hat
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| 5. nose
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| 6.coat
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| 7. pipe
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| 8. trousers
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| 9. chair
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| 10. shoes
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Nouns
Adjectives
Structure Words
Sayings
What bird is that?
Warm water is said to be good for birds.
They are to come and play among the stones.
Where is the nearest water?
The old man is resting.
His hand is holding a long pipe.
His working life is over.
His shoes are not to become old.
The Infinitive
"to" is made much use of.
It is put before the root form of the verb to express purpose.
This is called the infinitive form of the verb.
As is seen in these examples:
am I to get you a resting place?
he will say what you are to do.
he went to take his rest
better for him to have a great stone.
and to come to his end
It is also quite usual to say the opposite of a statement by putting "not" in front of "to".
The opposite has the name, negative, and the negative of the above is:
am I not to get you a resting place?
he will say what you are not to do
better for him not to have a great stone
and not to come to his end
Noah Builds His Ark
And God said to Noah, The end of all flesh has come;
the earth is full of their violent doings, and now I will put an end to them with the earth.
Make for yourself an ark of gopher wood with rooms in it, and make it safe from the water inside and out.
And this is the way you are to make it: it is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide, and thirty cubits high.
You are to put a window in the ark, a cubit from the roof, and a door in the side of it, and you are to make it with a lower and second and third floors.
For truly, I will send a great flow of waters over the earth, for the destruction from under the heaven of all flesh in which is the breath of life;
everything on the earth will come to an end.
But with you I will make an agreement;
and you will come into the ark, you and your sons and your wife and your sons' wives with you.
And you will take with you into the ark two of every sort of living thing, and keep them safe with you;
they will be male and female.
Two of every sort of bird and cattle and of every sort of living thing which goes on the earth will you take with you to keep them from destruction.
And make a store of every sort of food for yourself and them.
And all these things Noah did;
as God said, so he did.
Additional Reading
There are stories among many different nations of a big rain that took place a very long time back.
Some experts say that the world was very wet after what is named the ice age, and that may be the reason for some of those accounts.
This is not said in this story, of course, but it does help to keep in mind that this is not the only account of a big rain which led to much destruction and loss of life.
The main point here is that Noah was a good man, so he was given a special task.
The measurements of the ark give us the picture of a very big ship with three floors in it.
It is known that big ships could be made.
It is certain that the Chinese could make big ships with floors in them quite early in their history.
So this story has special interest for us as an example of early knowledge of ships.
He must have been working for many years to make such a big vessel, and it must have given a lot of doubt as to his soundness of mind.
We may have a sad feeling for him working away in the dry times before it rained and having to put up with the laughter of all the persons around him.
Noah had an agreement with God.
Only a good man would be able to make such an agreement.
It was that he and his family and the animals would all be free from the destruction about to take place.
There was also a decision that this kind of destruction would never be mankind's experience again.
Noah made an altar with which to show his respect.
He did this after he and all those with him had been given their freedom from the ark to have a normal life on the dry land.
Helpful Notes
| flesh
| thing (meat) about the bones of the body.
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| mention
| giving a soft statement about something.
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| violent
| making forceful actions.
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| agreement
| a happy relation while talking face to face.
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| cattle
| a number of cows.
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| measurement
| putting a number to things.
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| laughter
| the sound of the voice while happy or bitter.
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| animals
| living things that come and go.
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