16 / PART ONE: THE BASICS you in the front row! The second one also suggests that ‘he’ was moved by someone else. The following are the correct versions: I was sitting in the front row. or I had sat in the front row. and He was standing behind me. or He had stood behind me. The present participle is used with the verb ‘to be’. The past participle is used with the verb ‘to have’. Look at the following examples: To write to his mother. (infinitive) Running for a train. (present participle) Swum across the river. (past participle) These are not sentences as they contain only non-finite verbs. They have no subject and no tense. The following are sentences because they contain finite verbs: Making sense of sentences