In a sentence like: “The cat remains,” the cat is not moving in the ordinary sense. Still, the word remain is as much a verb as the verb clawed would be in the sentence: “The cat suddenly clawed its annoyer.” And remain would be a verb in the sentence I have quoted, while the word clawing, implying action of a definite kind, is an adjective in the sentence: “A clawing cat is not the best pet for a tot.”
The difference between verb and adjective is in the verb’s being seen as apart from the object it belongs to, and the adjective’s being seen as of it. When I say, “The grass is,” the being of the grass is thought of as apart from the grass. That a thing is, is seen as apart from what it is.
The fact that an independent verb and a noun have to be in each sentence, shows that it is necessary to think of what the world is, and what is of the world—which is also what the world does—as separate, while we see them as the same. I look at a book. I say, “The book.” This is not a sentence. I say: “The book has been here for two hours.” Nothing has happened to the book. What I have done is to see an aspect of the book as apart from the book: the aspect of the book is its having-been-here-for-two-hours aspect. —I can also say: “The book can be read.” The book again hasn’t done a thing. But I have used a verb, and made a complete sentence. Again, an aspect of the book, this time a possibility, has been considered as separate from the book itself. And an idea of motion has been put where no motion of the ordinary kind is.
The noun to the verb is as substance to form, being to motion, rest to change, sameness to difference, space to time, old to new, thing including to thing included.
In the sentence, “Hal sang,” a being, a rest idea, gets into motion by having a possibility of it considered as apart from it. If I said, “Hal stayed,” the possibility with Hal of staying is also considered as apart from him; and this means that Hal as a unit has been changed into a twoness of Hal and staying. There is change here: and there is also equivalence. In the phrase “sluggish Hal,” an aspect of Hal is not considered as a thing having the independent quality of Hal himself. —When a verb occurs, what happens is looked on as a separate thing, in the same way that the thing causing it to happen is, or the thing to which it happens.
The form aspects of the noun to be seen in the adjective and verb can all be made nouns themselves. If I took the verb threw in the sentence: “The energetic little fellow threw the ball,” I could make it a noun by saying, “The throwingness of the little fellow,” first having changed the independent verb to a present participle. And of course I could change an adjective like active into activity; and a past participial adjective like broken into brokenness. The fact that these changes can be made, points to the oneness of form and substance, the oneness of what a thing is with what it does, to be found in existence itself.