ABSTRACT
A notional imperative necessarily has relation to the future time. Where, as in Latin, there are two tenses in the imperative, both really refer to the future, the so-called present imperative referring either to the immediate future or to some indefinite time
262 TIME AND TENSE in the future, and the so-called future imperative being used chiefly with regard to some specially indicated time. A" perfect imperative" also refers to future time, the use of the perfect being a stylistic trick to indicate how rapidly the speaker wants his command executed: be gone! When we say Have done I we mean the same thing as "Stop at once I " or " Don't go on I " but this ill expressed circuitously: 'let that which you have already done (said) be enough.'
