Do the right thing + doing something

Question

a- You did the right thing coming to me.Does "coming to me" qualify just the "the right thing" or the whole clause- "you did the right" ?b- You did the right thing in coming to me.Is the first sentence, a, reduced form of sentence b?+c- You did the right thing by coming to me.Do sentence b and c mean the same thing?

CalifJim · Accepted Answer

mango pen 189Does "coming to me" qualify just the "the right thing"

No. That wouldn't make any sense. What is a "right thing coming to me"? I don't think that's a thing.

mango pen 189or the whole clause- "you did the right thing" ?

the whole clause

mango pen 189b- You did the right thing in coming to me. Is the first sentence, a, reduced form of sentence b?

Participle clauses are not generally analyzed as reduced clauses, so from that point of view there's nothing "reduced". You don't add or remove any meaning by adding "in", so in effect, you've created a paraphrase.

mango pen 189Do sentence b and c mean the same thing?

Yes, and both mean the same thing as the original. You can paraphrase by adding "by" as well as by adding "in". In the given sentence those amount to the same thing. These words make the relationship of the participle clause to the main clause more explicit.

Other paraphrases:

You did the right thing, which was to come to me.
Coming to me was the right thing (to do), and you came to me, so you did the right thing.

CJ

Do the right thing + doing something

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