The Future Tense In Lesson 10 you had a large number of examples of the Future ‘Tense, and I want to look at some of these now. In Book I, Lesson 18, you were told that to make the Future Tense we use wall with the infinitive of the verb, but with the ist Person we sometimes use evill and sometimes shail. “Yes,” you say, ‘but when do you use will and when do you use shall?” ‘The whole question of will and shall is a difficult one. Scottish and Trish and American speakers use I will or we will where English speakers use I shall or we shall, and many English people tend to use will on almost every occasion, But I will give you in as simple a manner as possible the general principles. If we want to say that we are going to do some- thing or that somethingis going tohappeninthefuture and if we want to express nothing beyond simple faturity, we say: The and person singular thoy exill; tok shalt are never used in ‘ordinary conversational Englah. ‘They are, therefore, anited here,LESSON TWELVE 8 ‘Take this little child's poem: ‘The north winds do blow And we sialf have snow ‘Anal what sell the robin do then, poor thing ? He'll sit in a bara, ‘To keep himself warm And fell hide his head under hia wing, poor thing. ‘The nor winds do blow Or take Andrew’s or Lilian’s sentence: " akall be tem in May.” “1 shall he Bifteon next year” ‘Their sentences and the one in the poem, “we shall have enow” are simply expressing something that will happen in the future. The snow will come, Andrew will he ten, and neither we nor he can do anything about it. We can’t stop the snow from fall- jing; Andrew can’t change his age even if he wants to. But sometimes, in addition to the idea of futurity, there is some feeling in our mind as well. Very often you are making a promise, ¢g., when Mrs. Priestley sai “We coon't forget your birthday, Andrew,” she is making Andrew a promise. ‘Or when Andrew says: “cont fortt to say Many Happy Meturn.” wil say ita» he is promising his sister that he will remember. ‘At other times the feeling may be willingness; you want to express that you are willing or that you ‘want to do something, e.g., Andrew says, “I will lend you my pen-knife.”8s ESSENTIAL ENGLISH When English people are being married, the clergy- maf says to the man, “Will you take this woman to be your wife ?”” and the man answers (‘I will.” Then the clergyman says to the woman, “ Will you take this man to be your husband ?" and she says “I will.” They are both willing to do that. Sometimes the feeling is determination. You want to express that you are determined to do some- thing. Perhaps your radio won’t work, so you have taken it to pieces, you have worked at it all’ evening, and still it won't work. But you have made up your mind that you are going to make it work, no matter how leng it takes, and you say : “I wild make this radio work, even if I have to stay up all night to doit. I:von’t let itbeat {wit reake this maaio work me.” "That’s determination. ‘To express a promise, willingness or deter- mination as well as futurity, we use “I (we) will” and not “I (we) shall.” Remember, for the interrogative we use “Shall 127 “Shall we ?” in all cases, not * Will 1?” “Will Shall I? or Shall we? often has the meaning ‘Do you want me to...?” or “Would you like me to Pe ‘Shall F open the window ?” “(Shall I get you a cup of tea?” “This wes mentioned in Book 1, Lesson 18.LESSON TWELVE 85 ~Sihall we all go to the theatre tonight ?”* “Shall we begin to work now ? Let's begia now, shall we 2"? ‘There is just one other point, though it is not very important. You have had two forms of the rst person singular and plural, viz. a B. Simple Futurity | Futurity with feeling A shall Iwill ‘We shall We wil What about the forms for the other Persons ? Well, the B forms are not used very often; that’s why I said that they were not very important. But you may meet them in your reading, so you may as well know them, Here they are side by side so that you can compare them: B. Fraturtty swith Promises Determination, Willingness, A Simple Futurity I shall hhe, she, ie will wwe shall you will they wil26 ESSENTIAL ENGLISH And here are some examples showing the use of the “B” forms with and and 3rd Persons: Me shal! do the work whether he wants to do it or not (orrouoMIRartON 18 THE SREAKER"S MI) ut Gou work hard, you shall have 2 holidey on Saturday (exoanse) ‘You shal! have the money as soon as I get it. (Rowse) You've damaged my bicycle; you skan'e have it again. (DETERMINATION IN THE STEARER"S MiteD) “Yow thall do ae Tell you (men, cows) ‘Those people want to bay my house, but they sham's have it. T won't sell it. (OETERMINATION. IN TE SPEAKER'S MIND) Going to By the way, you probably noticed in Lesson ro that other form of the future, going 40, “We are going to have a busy time after breakfast Going to is often used to express an intention, i.c., what you intend to do, what you have in mind to do at some future time, e.g, Hob says he is going 10(= fntends to) work hard some day, ‘but not today. Tam going to (= intend to) write a letter to my uncle to- ‘morrow afternoon. Lacie is going #0 buy a new car nest week. ‘This is the commonest and the easiest way of express ing the future; it saves all difficulty with shall and will, But you can’t use going to for Simple Futurity.” You can’t say: Tim going to be 12 years old tomorrow, or Today is the roth of October; tomorrovr is going to be the ‘oth.LESSON TWELVE & It can only be used for intention or strong proba- bility. Let me explain what I mean by “strong probability.” Here are two examples: ‘think iia gos fo rain. That is,"I think itis very probable ‘Tm afraid our new house is gamug 10 cost 2 lot of money. mancaner: T think my birthday party is going 10 be a very ‘good one. (She thinks it ia very probable that 3 will be a good party.) anprew: I think T am going to have a bad cold and then I ‘han’t be able to go to the party. ‘That last sentence shows the difference between “‘inten- tion” and _ “probability.” Andrew isn’t intending to have a cold. I should think he intends not to have a cold if he can help it, but there’s a strong probability. (Don’t you think so from the picture ?) ae ae Kaa We sy Od Wi enon AGL ie «0 1 snate NOT ne wite | se Wont ‘Suarce Furor