rst is rather extravagant: "The
propriety of these _imperfect passive tenses_ has been _doubted by almost
all_ our grammarians; though I believe but few of them have written many
pages without condescending to make use of them. Dr. Beattie says, 'One of
the greatest defects of the English tongue, with regard to the verb, seems
to be the want of an _imperfect passive participle_.' And yet he uses the
_imperfect participle_ in a _passive sense_ as often as most
writers."--_Pickbourn's Dissertation on the English Verb_.

"Several other expressions of this sort now and then occur, such as the
new-fangled and most uncouth solecism, 'is being done,' for the good old
English idiomatic expression, 'is doing,'--an absurd periphrasis, driving
out a pointed and pithy turn of the English language."--_N. A. Review_. See
_Wells's Grammar_, 1850, p. 161.

The term, "_imperfect passive tenses_," seems not a very accurate one;
because the present, the perfect, &c., are included. Pickbourn applies it
to any passive tenses formed from the simple "imperfect participle;" but
the phrase, "_passive verbs in the progressive form_," would better express
the meaning. The term, "_compound passive participle_," which Wells applies
above to "_being built_," "_being printed_," and the like, is also both
unusual and inaccurate. Most readers would sooner understand by it the
form, _having been built, having been printed_, &c. This author's mode of
naming participles is always either very awkward or not distinctive. His
scheme makes it necessary to add here, for each of these forms, a third
epithet, referring to his main distinction of "_imperfect_ and _perfect_;"
as, "the compound _imperfect_ participle passive," and "the compound
_perfect_ participle passive." What is "_being builded_" or "_being
printed_," but "an _imperfect passive participle_?" Was this, or something
else, the desideratum of Beattie?

[274] _Borne_ usually signifies _carried_; _born_ signifies _brought
forth_. J. K. Worcester, the lexicographer, speaks of these two participles
thus: "[Fist] The participle _born_ is used in the passive form, and
_borne_ in the active form, [with reference to birth]; as, 'He was _born_
blind,' _John_ ix.; 'The barren hath _borne_ seven,' I _Sam_. ii. This
distinction between _born_ and _borne_, though not recognized by grammars,
is in accordance with common usage, at least in this country. In many
editions of the Bible it is recognized; and in many