¹ Lg. 36.207-21 (1960).

² Nom₂ — Nom₃ is only a case of Type 1, e.g. The water [1] is too cold (for you [2]) to wash (yourself [3 = 2]), which is the same as The water [1] is too cold (for you [2]) to wash (your clothes [3]). Nom₁ = Nom₂ = Nom₃ is only a case of Type 5, e.g. John [1] is too young (for John [2 = 1]) to kill himself [3 = 1], the same as John [1] is too young (for John [2 = 1]) to eat mushrooms [3 ≠ 1].

³ Type 5 with enough is a more comfortable exemplification of Lees's formula Nom₁ + be + A (too) + for + N_a (219) than too itself, since it does not have to contend with the discontinuity of too (She is too weak for housework = She is weak too-much-for-housework, ~ She is weak enough-for-bed).

⁴ There appears to be a further restriction on these adjectives, which is that when the verb does not carry an auxiliary such as must and have to (the reason for this exception will appear), they are not only ‘personal’ but also ‘complimentary-uncomplimentary’. Thus with the complimentary adjective wise we can say You are wise to express these opinions, but with the more neutral literate, learned, it is more difficult: *You are literate to express these opinions. Similarly with fortunate in You are fortunate to have all these goods, which is a little less likely with the more neutral rich, You are rich to have all these goods, and becomes virtually impossible with the completely neutral moneyed: *You are moneyed to have all these goods. But with the auxiliary, the sentence is normal: You must be moneyed to have all these goods. The negatives, which are regularly uncomplimentary, are pretty free: You are illiterate to express these opinions.

The absence of a nominal corresponding to right and wrong proves only that there is a hole in the syntactic pattern: You are right (wrong) to complain, *You are a right (wrong) person to complain.

⁵ At first glance one is sure that the reason for entering He's ready to call twice on p. 213 is that one instance is intended to cover the meaning of the passive transformation He is ready to be called; but it turns out that both are active, and the distinction is a subtler one (see fn. 7). At any rate, it could not have been Lees's intention to leave this out, since it bears the same relationship to Type 6 that Type 4 bears to Type 5, and fits the generalized grammatical rules on p. 219. Extending Type 7 to cover it, the rules would be changed to read: ‘for + Nom₂‘ is chosen optionally for Types 4 and 7.

Probably those generalized rules should be changed still further. Consider: ‘Why don't you cheer him up?‘—Everybody here is too grumpy (for me) to make any headway. This seems to be a Type 5 sentence, yet Nom₁ ≠ Nom₂. It can be taken care of by introducing a Nom₃ in the VP: Everybody here is too grumpy (for me) to like (everybody) has Nom₃ = Nom₁ and is Type 4; Everybody here is too grumpy (for me) to make any headway has Nom₃ ≠ Nom₁.

This has repercussions in Type 1, which now becomes the same as Type 5. I have already listed numerous examples of Type 1 with impersonal noun subjects, but there is no real difference between The weather (times, etc.) is too bad (for us) to hope for a settlement and People are too angry (for us) to hope for a settlement.

We can make a conceptual generalization about this broader Type 5 (including 1) : The subject of the infinitive is picked up from an obvious contextual clue; the obvious contextual clue is often the subject of the main verb—the latter, restricted situation is Lees's Type 5.

⁶ Jespersen (III.11.61f) gives examples like His face was ghastly to see, The Boers are a hard nut to crack; and, with noun rather than adjective, That hisse Which is my heaven to have.

⁷ Two meanings are assigned to He is ready to go: ‘He agrees to go’ and 'He has prepared for going*. A better analogy for the first might be 'He is willing (disposed) to go' and for the second ‘He is readied to go (for going).‘

I recognize the distinction, but I distrust any test based on something as slippery as the preposition for, even when qualified as a ‘purpose-adverbial’. I am not convinced that the three constructions which Lees relates to the purpose-adverbial are all fundamentally alike in this respect or even that we have here to do with one and the same for. Compare She is ripe to kiss and He is too old to send. She is not ripe ‘in order’ to be kissed; she is ripe ‘and therefore’ kissable. He is not too old ‘in order’ to be sent; he is too old ‘and therefore’ unsendable. Even less can we say that in She's rather tall to be only twelve years old (presumably Type 5: too tall, pretty tall, awfully tall) there is any implied purpose-adverbial. She is not tall ‘in order to be’ or ‘for being’ twelve years old; she is tall for one so young—for here is a ‘standard of comparison’.

At the other extreme we have He is trained to swim, based on a verb whose purpose associations are obvious: he is trained in order to swim, for swimming. He is qualified to swim exhibits this still to a certain extent. So do He is readied to go, He is capacitated (habilitated) to vote. But as we go a step farther it begins to fade. The ‘towardness’ of the purpose is weakened. From They forced him to swim (~ They forced him to the wall) and They trained him to swim (They trained him to, toward, for swimming) we move to a for that indicates little more than a kind of ‘relatedness’ (eligible to vote, for voting = eligible in-respect-of voting), and then disappears altogether: He is habilitated to vote passes to He is able to vote, which Lees classes explicitly as Type 3 (215).

We can approach the purpose-adverbial question from another direction, related to the Type-3 sure. In Be careful (wary, watchful, alert, vigilant, on guard, on your toes) to grab the first opportunity we clearly have an ‘in order to grab’, ‘for grabbing’ association. It passes both the what ... for and the prenominai tests: a watchful grabber, What should I be watchful for? It is like ready in its Type-6 ‘prepared’ sense. But it is also like sure: Be careful not to forget, Be sure not to forget. Here the for has faded somewhat (I'll be careful—sure—to ask your permission = ‘will ask your permission’, not 'will be careful so as to ask it'). The kinship with sure is revealed in the assimilation of both to a kind of complex verbal related to not to fail, not to neglect, as be eager is related to want. It is also revealed in the imperative by the fact that both sure and careful may replace the infinitive with a conjunction: Be sure to tell me, Be sure and tell me; Be careful not to fall, Be careful and don't fall. If anything else is needed to show the haziness of the 3-6 borderline, we note that while He is alert to grab the first opportunity may be viewed as 'in order to grab, for grabbing', He is alert to help is more like He is anxious (eager) to help—Type 3. Do we have the same for in qualified to vote (for voting, as-regards voting) and alert to grab (for grabbing; as-regards grabbing) ?

From yet another direction we have a purposive for in These fins are useful (usable, good, perfect) to swim (with) (pronominal test impossible) and These facts are excellent to prove your point (with) (excellent proofs).

The for associations of Type 6 strike me as gradient.

⁸ It is an accident that we can say He chose to wait or He elected to wait but not *He selected to wait nor *He picked to wait. It is likewise an accident that to be sorry can readily take infinitive complements for either present or past action, while to regret finds it more difficult : I am sorry to be (to have been) the cause of your distress, I regret to be etc., *I regret to have been etc., where I regret having been is preferred.

Some instances of hole-filling that I have gathered: Mother suggested me to write (ten-year-old girl). The criminal courts hesitate committing mentally ill people (Los Angeles Daily News, 7 Jan. 1953, p. 40). By demanding the employee to swear he does not belong to organizations on the Attorney GeneraVs list ...,the Oklahoma legislature failed ... (Civil liberties 108.1, Jan. 1953). To aid an ex-convict get a job (‘Maisie’ radio program, 22 Mar. 1946). It is no coincidence that these are all crossovers involving -ing and the infinitive. The presence of a certain degree of idiomizing—which encourages the analysis that Lees rejects—is evident in pairs like determined to go ~ insistent on going, his courage to say no ~ his bravery in saying no, reluctance to go ~ resistance to going.

⁹ That is, You are welcome to this (business of) having people etc. A real insult has been delivered, and the gerundive, which is favored in ‘real’ contexts, is preferred to the infinitive, which is more hypothetical. Compare/ like playing golf—uttered while actually playing, and I like to play golf—uttered at home; or I'm afraid to do it wrong—no real action necessarily contemplated, and I'm afraid of doing it wrong—real action probably contemplated. The example with welcome proves that stripping a sentence to its minimum—*He is welcome to going—is a risky test of grammaticality; it often falsifies the potentialities of the construction.

¹⁰ The idiomizing of these individual words is seen in the accidental fact that reluctant to agree is normal, *averse to agree is not. Cf. also I am inclined to accept, I am resigned to accepting, where the -ing is favored for an inevitable, ‘real’ act.

¹¹ People have been used to trust the past as a guide (Barbara Deming in The nation, 17 Dec. 1960, p. 471). I would say used to trusting. With accustomed, my dialect wavers.

¹² Note the blend with ready in He's fit to explode.

¹³ Compare the backward-looking angry to be going (the previously laid plan to go angers me) with the forward-looking glad to go.

¹⁴ In He is crazy to do that there is an ambiguity with Type 8: He's eager to do that vs. Doing that classifies him as crazy.

¹⁵ Note again the idiomizing of certain adjectives: I am eager to learn the truth, but not (at least in my speech—for contrary evidence see Jespersen V.13.62) *I am desirous (hopeful) to learn the truth; I am curious to find out but not *I am inquisitive to find out.

¹⁶ Jespersen (V.I3.62) proposes a similar treatment: He desires to go → He is desirous to go → He is anxious (eager, curious) to go.

F. C. Tarr extensively documents a similar blending in Spanish, in Prepositional complementary clauses in Spanish, with special reference to the works of Pérez Galdós, Revue hispanique 129.1-264 (1922).

¹⁷ One can imagine a reply to this, responded to with You don't sóund very sure. Yet there is still some difference between this and the more personal guarantee. In the latter, the will can be the voluntary will, e.g. Will you guarantee right now to help me tomorrow?, but not in the former : *Will you be sure right now to help me tomorrow?—the will here is still futurity in Will you be sure to help me tomorrow? ~ Is it sure that you will help me tomorrow? But we feel the two to be closer together than this impersonal transformation suggests.

¹⁸ If these were really disparate constructions, we would be averse to putting them in the same slot. Note also that worthy fails Lees's ‘for’ test: *He is worthy for voting; this should put it in 3 rather than 6, as does also the fact that He is a worthy voter (the prenominai test) has nothing to do with his worth as a voter, in the way that He is a qualified voter has to do with his qualifications as a voter.

¹⁹ As a curiosity I offer this sextuple ambiguity, covering all but 3 (and 6) of Lees's types: But it's so damned glorious to yield!: 1. It's too glorious a day for us to admit defeat. 2. Yielding is glorious. 4. The thing is too glorious for us to give it up. 5. The thing is too glorious for it to stoop to admitting defeat. 7. It lends itself so gloriously to our yielding it. 8. It (the enemy nation) is so glorious in yielding (to our demands) (It is so glorious of it to etc.).