§ 189. The infinitive may serve as object in a special sentence pattern with a formal it as subject. It is lexically dependent here as it follows quite definite verbs.

The most commonly occurring verbs after which the infinitive is used in this function are: to amaze, to annoy, to cause, to com- fort, to delight, to distress, to enrage, to excite, to frighten, to hurt, to interest, to irritate, to mean, to occur, to please, to puz- zle, to shock, to soothe, to startle, to stir, to surprise, to trouble, to upset, to worry and some others.

The verbs in this sentence pattern are usually followed by some other objects (direct, indirect or prepositional) which pre- cede the infinitive.

e-g. In those days my experience of life at first hand was small, and it excited me to come upon an incident.

It did not annoy him to live always in the same shabby room.

It pleased her particularly to see how often the other chil- dren asked her son how they should play.

It never occurred to him to pretend that he had no influence

on events.

Besides, there are a number of set phrases which are in com mon use and are treated as verb equivalents. They are all differ- ent in structure and in meaning. But since they have the function of the predicate in the sentence they are best to be classed as verb equivalents and treated here.

e.g. It does me good to watch her playing with the other children. It couldn't do any harm to take her out of town. It will take a long time to talk over the whole of it with you. It took several days for her to fully realize it. A porter's voice informed them that it was time to board the

train.

One morning it was his turn to cook breakfast. Mr Brooke said it was up to the girl to decide whether or not

to accept the invitation.

The infinitive is always preceded by to in this function. The subject of the infinitive in most cases is the person denot- ed by the noun (or pronoun) object following the verb.

e.g. It would interest him to hear about it. It didn't occur to me to ask him about it. (For comparison with the ing-form see §§ 218 and 239.)

§ 190. In a sentence pattern with it as a formal subject, the in- finitive (with the particle to) as object is also found after a con- siderable number of adjectives, adjectivized participles and ing- forms. The most commonly occurring of them are: absurd, advisable. amazing, astonishing, awful, awkward, bad, careless, characteristic, charming, complicated, convenient, correct, cruel, curious, custom- ary, dangerous, decent, delightful, desirable, difficult, dull, easy, embarrassing, enough, essential, fair, fine, foolish, funny, futile good, hard, helpful, (dis)honourable, horrid, important, insulting interesting, intolerable, jolly, (un)just, kind, late, marvellous- monstrous, naive, (un)natural, (un)necessary, nice, normal, odd- pleasant, (im)possible, preposterous, proper, queer, (un)reasonable remarkable, ridiculous, right, sad, safe, satisfying, sensible, shock

ing, silly, splendid, strange, stupid, sufficient, suitable, surprising, sweet, terrible, typical, unbearable, useful, useless, vital, wicked, (un)wise, wonderful, wrong, etc.

e.g. It's a little late to admit it, I know.

It was surprising to hear how strong his voice sounded.

It's stupid to fall asleep like this, it gives you a headache.

It's wrong to hurt people.

It was unwise to be rude to David.

It's unusual to meet a shy girl nowadays.

It's important to remember the figures.

Note. It should be mentioned that it is worth while is normally followed by an infinitive object whereas it is worth is modified by an ing-form object (see "Verbs", §219).

e.g. It might be worth while to mention that there is a train soon after 5.

Do you think it would be worth while to open a shop somewhere else in the neighbourhood?

The subject of the infinitive in this sentence pattern is usually associated with every or any person or an indefinite number of unidentified persons (see the examples above). Yet it is not un- usual for the infinitive object in this sentence pattern to have a subject of its own. In this case the infinitive far-phrase is used.

e.g. It was rare for him to go out to dinner.

It's very good for them to have an older man with plenty of experience to come to for advice.

"Of course," said Mont, "it's natural for young men to be in- terested in politics."

It was necessary for her to earn her living as quickly as she could.

The peculiar feature of this sentence pattern is that the infini- tive and its subject can be introduced by the preposition of.

e.g. "It's kind of you to come," she said. It was inconsiderate of her to ask that.

He thought it was wrong of him to go off forever and leave his mother all on her own.

(For comparison with the ing-form see §§ 219 and 239.)