GMAT grammar querry

[drrohitbaslas]

Dear Teachers

Could u pl ans my querry?

Anarchists believe that the ideal society is one in which the motivation to maintain law & order lies in the innate reasonableness of human nature rather than in the threat of force.


lnstead of lies can we write "lie".

[Coffa]

Originally Posted by drrohitbaslas

Dear Teachers
Could u pl ans my querry?
Anarchists believe that the ideal society is one in which the motivation to maintain law & order lies in the innate reasonableness of human nature rather than in the threat of force.
lnstead of lies can we write "lie".

No, you can't. All regular verbs like 'lie' in English are conjugated in the same way: you use the verb stem alone except for the third person singular, where you add 's' to the verb stem.

In the sentence above, the subject of the verb 'lie' is the singular noun 'the motivation', so the verb is in the third person singular. Hence, we must say 'lies', not 'lie'.