SUBJUNCTIVE MOOD.

PRESENT TENSE.

Singular.                       Plural.
1.  If I be reading,               1.  If we be reading,
2.  If thou be reading,            2.  If you be reading,
3.  If he be reading;              3.  If they be reading.

IMPERFECT TENSE.

Singular.                       Plural.
1.  If I were reading,             1.  If we were reading,
2.  If thou were reading,          2.  If you were reading,
3.  If he were reading;            3.  If they were reading.

IMPERATIVE MOOD.

Sing. 2.  Be [thou] reading, or Do thou be reading;
Plur. 2.  Be [ye or you] reading, or Do you be reading.

PARTICIPLES.

1. The Imperfect.  2. The Perfect.  3. The Preperfect. 
Being reading.       ---------          Having been reading.

FAMILIAR FORM WITH ‘THOU.’

NOTE.—­In the familiar style, the second person singular of this verb, is usually and more properly formed thus:  IND.  Thou art reading, Thou was reading, Thou hast been reading, Thou had been reading, Thou shall or will be reading, Thou shall or will have been reading.  POT.  Thou may, can, or must be reading; Thou might, could, would, or should be reading; Thou may, can, or must have been reading; Thou might, could, would, or should have been reading.  SUBJ.  If thou be reading, If thou were reading.  IMP.  Be [thou,] reading, or Do thou be reading.

OBSERVATIONS.

OBS. 1.—­Those verbs which, in their simple form, imply continuance, do not admit the compound form:  thus we say, “I respect him;” but not, “I am respecting him.”  This compound form seems to imply that kind of action, which is susceptible of intermissions and renewals.  Affections of the mind or heart are supposed to last; or, rather, actions of this kind are complete as soon as they exist.  Hence, to love, to hate, to desire, to fear, to forget, to remember, and many other such verbs, are incapable of this method of conjugation.[265] It is true, we often find in grammars such models, as, “I was loving, Thou wast loving, He was loving,” &c.  But this language, to express what the authors intend by it, is not English.  “He was loving,” can only mean, “He was affectionate:”  in which sense, loving is an adjective, and susceptible of comparison.  Who, in common parlance, has ever said, “He was loving me,” or any thing like it?  Yet some have improperly published various examples, or even whole conjugations, of this spurious sort.  See such in Adam’s Gram., p. 91; Gould’s Adam, 83; Bullions’s English Gram., 52; his Analyt. and Pract.