---
title: The thought that in the course of his past lives he had endured old… — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: The thought that in the course of his past lives he had endured old age, sickness, and death, times without number, terrified him, and he resolved to become a monk. Who acts: Gotama. A sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 1, with its dependency tree and the 
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74064/1/213/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The grateful elephant](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74064/) / [Opening, part 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74064/1/) / 213

# The grateful elephant, Opening, part 1, sentence 213

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The thought that in the course of his past lives he had endured old age, sickness, and death, times without number, terrified him, and he resolved to become a monk.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Gotama · **What happens:** live, endure, resolve, become · **To what, where:** thought, course, old age, monk

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Gotama), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg74064:1:229
# text = The thought that in the course of his past lives he had endured old age, sickness, and death, times without number, terrified him, and he resolved to become a monk.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	thought	thought	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
3	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	10	obj	_	_
4	in	in	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	course	course	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obl	_	_
7	of	of	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	9	nmod:poss	_	_
9	past	past	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nmod	_	_
10	lives	live	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	2	acl:relcl	_	_
11	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
12	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	aux	_	_
13	endured	endure	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	10	ccomp	_	_
14	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	amod	_	_
15	age	age	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
17	sickness	sickness	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	death	death	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
22	times	time	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	2	appos	_	_
23	without	without	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
24	number	number	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
26	terrified	terrified	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	2	conj	_	_
27	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	31	punct	_	_
29	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	31	cc	_	_
30	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	31	nsubj	_	_
31	resolved	resolve	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	26	conj	_	_
32	to	to	PART	TO	_	33	mark	_	_
33	become	become	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	31	xcomp	_	_
34	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	35	det	_	_
35	monk	monk	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	33	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
36	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **live** | present |  | the thought and death |  | the course of Gotama's past |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **endure** | past · perfect | Gotama | old age and sickness |  |  |  |  | vn exist-47.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme age=Circumstance |
| 3 | **resolve** | past | Gotama |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **become** | to-infinitive | Gotama *not said here* | a monk |  |  |  |  | vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient |

<!-- .note -->
One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Project Gutenberg book 74064 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 212](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74064/1/212/)
- next →: [sentence 214](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74064/1/214/)
- ↑ back to [Opening, part 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg74064/1/)