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perfect tenses

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  Ed Good  —  Grammar Tips
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The perfect tenses are under attack by many misinformed, but otherwise well-educated, writers and speakers. The tense does express qualities of verbs that are otherwise incapable of expression and is therefore worth retaining.

We have three perfect tenses: (1) present perfect (I have finished), (2) past perfect (I had finished), and (3) future perfect (I will have finished). All are formed by using the auxiliary verb have with the past participle of the main verb.

See present-perfect tense, past-perfect tense, and future-perfect tense.

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