Rise vs Raise & Lie vs Lay
Level B2 · Verb Patterns
rise/raise and lie/lay are two pairs of commonly confused verbs. In both pairs, one verb is intransitive (no direct object — the subject does the action to itself) and the other is transitive (needs a direct object — the subject does the action to something else). rise and lie are intransitive: The sun rises every morning; I lie down when I'm tired. raise and lay are transitive: She raised her hand; He laid the book on the table.
The four verbs and their forms:
- rise, rose, risen (intransitive) = to go up by itself, with no object: Prices are rising. The sun rose at six. Smoke had risen from the chimney. raise, raised, raised (transitive) = to lift or move something up, with an object: She raised her hand. They raised taxes. He has raised three children (also: to bring up).
- lie, lay, lain (intransitive, meaning 'to recline') = to be in or move into a flat, resting position, with no object: I lie on the sofa every evening. She lay in bed all morning. The cat has lain there for hours. lay, laid, laid (transitive) = to put something down carefully, with an object: He laid the baby in the crib. She laid the table for dinner. They have laid new carpet in the hallway.
- The past simple of lie (lay) is spelled and pronounced exactly like the base form of lay (lay) — this is the single biggest source of confusion: I lay on the beach yesterday is the past of lie (I lie on the beach today), not a form of the verb lay.
- There's also a separate, regular verb lie, lied, lied, meaning 'to say something untrue' (He lied about his age) — completely unrelated in meaning to lie meaning 'to recline', though spelled the same in the base form.
The most common mistake is using lay where lie is needed — I need to go lay down is wrong because there's no object; it should be I need to go lie down. A second common mistake is using rise where raise is needed, or vice versa — He raised at 6am is wrong (no object, so it should be rose); She rised her hand is wrong on two counts: the verb for this transitive action is raise, not rise, and its past is the regular raised (there is no form rised).
Ask whether there's a direct object receiving the action: if something is doing the action by itself, with no object, use rise or lie; if the subject is doing the action to something else, named right after the verb, use raise or lay. Also check the meaning: rise/raise are about upward movement; lie/lay are about a flat, resting position (not to be confused with the unrelated lie meaning 'tell an untruth').