Final answer:
The sentence 'I forgot to meet John earlier.' indicates a failure to remember to meet John in the past, whereas the sentence 'I forget meeting John earlier.' is grammatically incorrect when referring to the past. It should be 'I forgot meeting John earlier.' to correctly describe a past event that the speaker does not remember.
Step-by-step explanation:
The sentence "I forgot to meet John earlier." uses the simple past tense forgot, indicating that at some point in the past, the speaker failed to remember their commitment to meet John. It refers to a specific event that did not happen due to the speaker's forgetfulness.
On the other hand, "I forget meeting John earlier." is not grammatically correct if the speaker intends to talk about a past event. The correct past tense form should be "I forgot meeting John earlier," which would suggest that the speaker does not remember the act of meeting John that occurred in the past. It's important to note that "forget" in the simple present tense (as shown in the incorrect version) is not commonly used to refer to past events.
Comparing to the provided examples, "I lost a glove on my walk, but I found it later." is the correct sentence because it accurately uses the simple past tense "found."