Page 128 - Basic English Usage

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175 infinitive: negative, progressive, perfect, passive

Negative infinitive: | not+ infinitive

Try not to be late. (NOT ... tenetbeaie-)
| decided not to study medicine. (NOT ... fenetstudy ...)
You'd better not say that again.
Why not tell me about your problems?
For the difference between the infinitive with and without fo, see 179.
Progressive infinitive: | (to) be... -ing
it's nice to be sitting here with you.
This time tomorrow I'll be lying on the beach.

Perfect infinitive: | (to) have + past participle
It's nice to have finished work.
Ann said she was sorry to have missed you.
You should have told me you were coming.
For perfect infinitives after moda! verbs (should, might etc), see 202.3.

Passive infinitive: | (to) be past participle
+
There's a lot of work to be done.
She ought to be told about it.
That window must be repaired before tonight.
For the meaning of passive forms, see 237.

176 infinitive: use

Subject
An infinitive can be the subject of a sentence.
To learn Chinese is not easy.
But we more often use a structure with ifas a ‘preparatory subject’ (see
187), or with an -ing form as subject (see 180).
It is not easy to learn Chinese.
Learning Chinese isn't easy.

After verb
We often use an infinitive after another verb.
It's beginning to rain.
| expect to be free tomorrow evening.
! don't want to see you again.