The division of the verbs adopted in all other European languages into _Active_ and _Passive_, seems to be useless in Slavic; for their being active or passive has no influence upon their flexion; and the forms of the Latin Passive and Deponent must in Slavic be expressed by a circumlocution. A division of more importance and springing from the peculiarity of the language itself, is that into verbs _Perfect_ and _Imperfect_. Neither the Greek, nor the Latin, nor the German, nor any of the languages derived from them, admits of a similar distinction. It seems therefore difficult for persons not perfectly acquainted with any Slavic dialect, to form to themselves a clear idea of it. It is however one of their most striking features, which adds very considerably to their general richness and power. The relation in which the perfect and imperfect verbs stand to each other, is about the same as that of the perfect and imperfect tenses in the conjugation of the Latin verb. Perfect verbs express that an action takes place a single time, and therefore is entirely completed and past; from their very nature it results, that they have no imperfect tense, and their conjugation must be in general incomplete. Imperfect verbs express that the same action continues. Both have in most cases the same radical syllable, and may be formed with a certain degree of freedom; thus in Servian, _viknuti_, to cry once, _vikati_, to be crying; _umriyeti_, to die, _umirati_, to be dying. There are however others, which stand in the same relation to each other without issuing from the same verbal stock; e.g. in Servian, _tchuti_ and _sluskati_, to hear; _retji_ and _govoriti_, to speak, etc. The Polish language, which is remarkably rich in every kind of flexion, has a still simpler and more regular way of forming also a frequentative out of almost every verb; e.g. _czytam_, I read, _czytivam_, I read often; _biore_, take, _bieram_, I take often, etc. In Bohemian, which in respect to grammar is by far the most cultivated of the Slavic languages, there is a refinement in the tenses, of which even the most perfect knowledge of the classical languages gives hardly any idea, and the right use of which is seldom, if ever, acquired by foreigners. Duration, decision, repetition, all the different shades of time and purpose, which other languages have to circumscribe in long phrases, the Bohemian expresses by a slight alteration of one or two syllables. Not less rich in these variations of the verb is the Russian. Besides a vast treasure of original, genuine _indefinite_ verbs, as they call all those, which have the general character of the verb of other languages, without any allusion to the duration or continuance of the action, they have verbs _simple, frequentative_ and _perfect_. A single example will illustrate the fact: Verb indefinite, _dvigat'_,[15] to move. Verb simple, _dvinut'_, to move a single time. Verb frequentative, _dvigivat'_, to move repeatedly.[16]