+Direction.+--_Study carefully the Definitions and principles given under
the head of case, Lesson 119, and then correct these errors, giving your
reasons in every instance:--_
1. It is not me you are in love with. [Footnote: Dr. Latham defends _It is
me,_ but condemns _It is him,_ and _It is her_. Dean Alford regards as
correct the forms condemned by Latham, and asserts that _thee_ and _me_
are correct in, "The nations not so blest as _thee_" "Such weak minister
as me may the oppressor bruise." Professor Bain justifies _If I were
him, It was her, He is better than me,_ and even defends the use of
_who_ as an objective form by quoting from Shakespeare, "_Who_ servest
thou under?" and from Steele, "_Who_ should I meet?"
They justify such expressions as _It is me_ from the analogy of the
French _c'est moi_, and on the ground that they are "more frequently
heard than the prescribed form." But such analogy would justify _It are
them (ce sont eux)_; and, if the argument from the speech of the
uneducated is to have weight, we have good authority for _"Her ain't a
calling we: us don't belong to she."_ A course of reading will satisfy
one that the best writers and speakers in England are not in the habit
of using such expressions as _It is me_, and that these are almost, if
not quite unknown in American literature.
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