I. A command or request. =Lähe nyt kanssa laulamahan=, _come to sing with
me_ (Kal. i. 14). =Toki tullos toinen kerta=, _come again_ (Kal. v. 137).
=Käy pian välehen jou’u=, _go quickly and finish the business_ (Kal. l.
211). =Ellös menkö poikaseni Parempikin itseäsi=, _aspire not, my son,
to those that are better than thyself_ (Kal. xi. 69).
II. A condition. =Sano mitä sanot, en siitä kuitenkaan välitä=, _you
may say what you like, but I don’t care_. =Teen minä sen vaikka hän
kieltäköönkin=, _I shall do it, even though he forbid it_.
_The Passive._
The passive, as has already been mentioned in the Accidence, is
impersonal. =Käytetään= means _there is a using_, or _one uses, people
use_. The clearest proof of the real character of the form is to be found
in the fact that the verb substantive =olla=, _to be_, has a so-called
passive.
Examples:—=Niin kohta kun ollaan tultu=, _as soon as people come_. =Ennen
oltiin terveempiä=, _people were healthier formerly_. =Siihen oltaneen
tyytyväisiä=, _this will probably prove satisfactory_ (_people will be
satisfied with this_). =Järvellä oltaessa tuuli kovasti=, _while they
were on the lake, the wind blew violently_.
(1) The passive of ordinary verbs is used absolutely; that is to say, no
noun is connected with it as subject or object. =Koulussa kirjoitetaan ja
luetaan=, _they read and write in the school_. =Helsingissä huvitellaan
paljo talven aikoina=, _there is much amusement in Helsingfors in winter
time_. =Suomen järvissä ja joissa kalastetaan=, _people fish_ (or _there
is fishing_) _in the lakes and rivers of Finland_.
(2) As the above examples show, the passive represents the action of
a verb without designating the agent. It is not unnatural that such
forms should be used in an imperative or optative sense, for the second
singular of the imperative is simply the root of the verb. It is true
that the imperative is the closed root, due to the loss of =k=, but like
the passive it has no sign of person.
This use of the passive for the imperative is particularly common in
dialects, though it is also found in the literary language. Its usual
meaning is ‘_Let us_.’ =Mennään sisään=, _let us go in_. =Luetaan=, _let
us read_, or _it’s time to read_. =Lähdetään kotia=, _we ought to go
home_. =Mennäänkö jalan vain ajetaanko hevosella?= _Shall we go on foot,
or take a carriage?_
(3) This use of the passive for the imperative is important as explaining
the common use of the form with a nominative case. Such a phrase as =mies
tunnetaan= can be correctly translated as _the man is known_; but there
is no doubt that the nominative is really the object of an impersonal
verb, which naturally remains invariable, whatever the noun is. Now the
object of the imperative is also put in the nominative and not in the
accusative, though both in the case of the imperative and the passive
it may be put in the partitive, if partial. It would seem that in these
forms of the verbs, where the agent is not denoted by any suffix, it was
felt that the sense was sufficiently clear without adding any termination
to the noun to mark its exact relation to the verb.
The object of the passive, as above stated, can be either in the
nominative, if total, or in the partitive, if partial.
_a._ Nominative. =Koira ajetaan huoneesta ulos=, _the dog is sent out of
the room_. =Palvelija lähetetään viemään kirjettä postiin=, _the servant
is sent to take a letter to the post_. =Hevoset valjastetaan=, _the
horses are being harnessed_. =Ruis kylvetään syksyllä=, _rye is sown in
the autumn_. =Keskellä yötä sammutetaan tulet=, _the lights are put out
at midnight_. =Tässä sodassa tapettiin viisikymmentä tuhatta miestä=,
_fifty thousand men were killed in this war_.
_b._ Partitive. =Miksi sanotaan sitä Englannin kielellä?= _What is that
called in English?_ =Jos ei aleta varhain, niin ei työtä saada aikanansa
valmiiksi=, _the work won’t be ready in time if not begun early_.
=Poikaa ei vielä pantu kouluun=, _the boy was no longer sent to school_.
=Ei vielä ollut uutta kirkkoa rakennettu=, _the new church had not yet
been built_. =Ei kynttilätä sytytetä ja panna wakan ala=, _neither do men
light a candle and put it under a bushel_, S. Matt. v. 15.
When the personal pronouns are used with the verb, it is commoner,
particularly in speaking, to put them in the accusative ending in =t=,
e.g. =minut=, =sinut=, =hänet nähdään=, is more usual than =minä=,
=sinä=, =hän nähdään=. But the form with the nominative is not only
grammatically correct, but found in writing, especially in the Bible,
e.g. Rom. viii. 36, =Sinun tähtes me kuoletetaan yli päivää: me pidetään
niinkuin teurastettavat lampaat=, _for thy sake we are killed all the day
long: we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter_. Similarly 2 Cor. xi.
36, =Kuka pahoitetaan ja en minä pala?= _Who is offended and I burn not._
=Sillä he ravitaan=, _for they shall be filled_, S. Matt. v. 6. =Että te
heiltä nähtäisiin=, _that ye may be seen of them_, S. Matt. vi. 1[15].
The conjugation of a passive form contains not only the strictly
impersonal forms, like =luetaan=, _people read_, =luettiin=, _people did
read_, but also compound tenses formed with the past passive participle
which stand grammatically upon a different footing. For the participle
in question is a simple adjective (or substantive), and such phrases
as =kirja on luettu=, =kirjat ovat luetut= are exactly analogous to
=kirja on hyvä= and =kirjat ovat hyvät=. In some cases, however, double
constructions are possible: one can say either =kirjat eivät ole
löydetyt=, _the books have not been found_, which is a simple adjectival
construction; or =kirjoja ei ole löydetty=, in which the construction
with the participle is assimilated to that with the other forms of the
verb. If a participle of =olla= is employed in a compound tense in
this construction it must be the passive participle. =Kirjaa ei oltu
löydetty=, _the book was not found_.