[*] 318. As final clauses after past tenses express some person's previous purpose or motive, they allow the double construction of indirect discourse (667, 1); so that, instead of the optative, they can have the mood and tense which the person himself would have used in conceiving the purpose. Thus we can say either ἦλθεν ἵνα ἴδοι, he came that he might see, or ἦλθεν ἵνα ἴδῃ, because the person himself would have said ἔρχομαι ἵνα ἴδω, I come that I may see. Hence the subjunctive in final clauses after past tenses is very common, in some writers even more common than the regular optative. E.g.
- “Ἐπεκλώσαντο δ᾽ ὄλεθρον ἀνθρώποις, ἵνα ᾖσι καὶ ἐσσομένοισιν ἀοιδή” Od. viii. 579.
- “Ἀχλὺν δ᾽ αὖ τοι ἀπ᾽ ὀφθαλμῶν ἕλον, ἣ πρὶν ἐπῆεν, ὄφρ᾽ ἐὺ γιγνώσκῃς ἠμὲν θεὸν ἠδὲ καὶ ἄνδρα” Il. v. 127.
- “Ἀριστεὺς ξυνεβούλευεν ἐκπλεῦσαι, ὅπως ἐπὶ πλέον ὁ σῖτος ἀντίσχῃ” THUC. i. 65.
- “Ἦλθον πρεσβευσόμενοι, ὅπως μὴ σφίσι τὸ Ἀττικὸν （ ναυτικὸν ） προσγενόμενον ἐμπόδιον γένηται” Id. i. 31.
- “Ἐχώρουν ἐκ τῶν οἰκιῶν, ὅπως μὴ κατὰ φῶς θαρσαλεωτέροις οὖσι προσφέρωνται καὶ σφίσιν ἐκ τοῦ ἴσου γίγνωνται, ἀλλ᾽ ἥσσους ὦσι” Id. ii. 3.
- “Καὶ ἐπίτηδές σε οὐκ ἤγειρον, ἵνα ὡς ἥδιστα διάγῃς” PLAT. Crit. 43B.
- “Πλοῖα κατέκαυσεν ἵνα μὴ Κῦρος διαβῇ” XEN. An. i. 4, 18.
- “Ταύτας ἵνα κωλύηθ᾽ οἱ νόμοι συνήγαγον ὑμᾶς, οὐχ ἵνα κυρίας τοῖς ἀδικοῦσι ποιῆτε” DEM. xix. 1.
- “Καὶ περὶ τούτων ἐμνήσθην, ἵνα μὴ ταὐτὰ πάθητε” Id. iii. 6. (Here the purpose was conceived in the form ἵνα μὴ ταὐτὰ πάθωσιν.)
