Conditional Statements

Conditional Statements. Conditional statements limit the application of the principal clause by a subordinate clause in ‘if’ or ‘unless’: ‘If this, then that’. The if-clause is known as the protasis (meaning ‘stretching forth’) and the prinipal clause is called the apodosis (meaning ‘give-back’).

Broadly speaking, there are two types of conditional statement. The author may feel objectively neutral about whether the statement is true or not (these are said to be open conditions; open conditions are like simple equations: ‘If A, then B.’). Or the author may signal that the statement is hypothetical: that it is a way of representing something that did not happen then, does not happen now, or that may or will happen in the future. With reference to the past and present, such conditions are said to be unreal or contrafactual; with reference to the future they are said to be more or less vivid.

Open conditions in Latin are handled much as they are in English: an indicative is used in both clauses. The statement in English ‘If he says this, he is mistaken’ has two possible meanings: (a) ‘If he is now saying this, he is mistaken’; (b) ‘If ever he says this, he is mistaken’. Both are represented in Latin by sī hōc dīcit, errat. Statement (a) refers to the particular present, statement (b) refers to a general present (‘if ever’). Past open conditionals also may have particular or general reference and observe the same simple formula – the indicative in both clauses:

sī hoc dīxit, errāvit.‘If he said this, he was mistaken.’
sī hoc dīcēbat, errābat.‘If (= Whenever) he was saying this, he was making a mistake.’
sī peccāverat, poenās dābat.‘Whenever (= If ever) he had done wrong, he used to be punished.’

The open condition in the present may refer to a generalized second person singular (‘you’ in the sense of ‘one’). In this case, the protasis will have its verb in the subjunctive, for the same reason that relative clauses of characteristic take the subjunctive:

sī quid dīcās, creditur.‘If one says anything, it is believed.’

Hypothetical conditions are of two sorts: (a) ‘unreal’ conditions that refer to the present and past; and (b) ‘ideal’ that refer to the future. Ideal conditions are further divided between those are are ‘more likely’ and those that are ‘less likely’. All of these conditions in Latin, except the ‘future more likely’ conditional, require the subjunctive.

The imperfect subjunctive used in both clauses refers to present unreal situation (‘If I were you, I would …’); the pluperfect subjunctive refers to past unreal situations (‘If I had been there, I would have …’); a future more likely situation is represented by the future or future perfect indicative in both clauses (‘If it rains, I will stay home.’); the future less likely (or future conjectural) is represented by the present subjunctive, and is often translated by ‘should-would’: ‘If he should turn up, I would leave’.

Notice that English if often ambiguous in expressing conditionals, where Latin is not. The present-contrary-to-fact and the future-less-likely may take the same form in English:

sī hoc dīxeret, errāret.‘If he said (i.e. were [now] saying) this, he would be mistaken..’sī hoc dīcat, erret.‘If he said (i.e. should [in future] say) this, he would be mistaken.’

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Table: Hypothetical Conditionals

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PRESENT UNREAL:
Protasis: Imperfect SubjunctiveApodosis: Imperfect Subjunctive
sī hoc dīceret, errāret.^*‘If he were saying this, he would be mistaken.’also ‘If he said this, he would be mistaken.’ PAST UNREAL:
Protasis: Pluperfect SubjunctiveApodosis: Pluperfect Subjunctive
sī hoc dīxisset, errāvisset.^**‘If he had said this, he would have been mistaken.’ FUTURE LIKELY:
Protasis: Future/Future Perfect IndicativeApodosis: Future Indicative or Imperative
sī hoc dīcet, errābit.^†‘If he says this, he will be mistaken.’
sī hoc fēcerit, poenās dabit.‘If he (actually) does this, he will be punished.’ FUTURE LESS LIKELY:
Protasis: Present SubjunctiveApodosis: Present Subjunctive
sī hoc dīcat, erret.^°‘If he should say this, he would be mistaken.’also ‘If he said this, he would be mistaken.’

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^*Sometimes English omits ‘if’ and inverts the subject-verb order, putting ‘were’ first: “Were I you, I would not do this”.
^**This is often incorrectly expressed in conversational American English as ‘If he would have … he would have’. The past perfect forms in these conditionals (‘had said’) etc. are actually perfect subjunctives.
^† Notice that English uses a present tense in the protasis, a future in the apodosis. We do not translate the future perfect as such.
^°Sometimes English omits the ‘if’ and inverts the subject-verb order, putting ‘should’ first: “Should he say this, he would be mistaken”. Notice that English may use ‘were’ (the past subjunctive) with the infinitive to denote futurity: “Were he to say this, he would be mistaken”.

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