Scutcheons and coats of arms hereditary,where they have any their any eminent privileges,are honourable;otherwise not for their power consisteth either in such privileges,or in riches,or some such thing as is equally honoured in other men.This kind of honour,commonly called gentry,has been derived from the ancient Germans.For there never was any such thing known where the German customs were unknown.Nor is it now anywhere in use where the Germans have not inhabited.The ancient Greek commanders,when they went to war,had their shields painted with such devices as they pleased;insomuch as an unpainted buckler was a sign of poverty,and of a common soldier;but they transmitted not the inheritance of them.The Romans transmitted the marks of their families;but they were the images,not the devices of their ancestors.Amongst the people of Asia,Africa,and America,there is not,nor was ever,any such thing.Germans only had that custom;from whom it has been derived into England,France,Spain and Italy,when in great numbers they either aided the Romans or made their own conquests in these western parts of the world.
For Germany,being anciently,as all other countries in their beginnings,divided amongst an infinite number of little lords,or masters of families,that continually had wars one with another,those masters,or lords,principally to the end they might,when they were covered with arms,be known by their followers,and partly for ornament,both painted their armor,or their scutcheon,or coat,with the picture of some beast,or other thing,and also put some eminent and visible mark upon the crest of their helmets.And this ornament both of the arms and crest descended by inheritance to their children;to the eldest pure,and to the rest with some note of diversity,such as the old master,that is to say in Dutch,the Here-alt,thought fit.But when many such families,joined together,made a greater monarchy,this duty of the herald to distinguish scutcheons was made a private office apart.And the issue of these lords is the great and ancient gentry;which for the most part bear living creatures noted for courage and rapine;or castles,battlements,belts,weapons,bars,palisades,and other notes of war;nothing being then in honour,but virtue military.Afterwards,not only kings,but popular Commonwealths,gave diverse manners of scutcheons to such as went forth to the war,or returned from it,for encouragement or recompense to their service.All which,by an observing reader,may be found in such ancient histories,Greek and Latin,as make mention of the German nation and manners in their times.
Titles of honour,such as are duke,count,marquis,and baron,are honourable;as signifying the value set upon them by the sovereign power of the Commonwealth:which titles were in old time titles of office and command derived some from the Romans,some from the Germans and French.Dukes,in Latin,duces,being generals in war;counts,comites,such as bore the general company out of friendship,and were left to govern and defend places conquered and pacified;marquises,marchioness,were counts that governed the marches,or bounds of the Empire.Which titles of duke,count,and marquis came into the Empire about the time of Constantine the Great,from the customs of the German militia.But baron seems to have been a title of the Gauls,and signifies a great man;such as were the kings'or princes'men whom they employed in war about their persons;and seems to be derived from vir,to ber,and bar,that signified the same in the language of the Gauls,that vir in Latin;and thence to bero and baro:so that such men were called berones,and after barones;and (in Spanish)varones.But he that would know more,particularly the original of titles of honour,may find it,as I have done this,in Mr.
Selden's most excellent treatise of that subject.In process of time these offices of honour,by occasion of trouble,and for reasons of good and peaceable government,were turned into mere titles,serving,for the most part,to distinguish the precedence,place,and order of subjects in the Commonwealth:and men were made dukes,counts,marquises,and barons of places,wherein they had neither possession nor command,and other titles also were devised to the same end.
Worthiness is a thing different from the worth or value of a man,and also from his merit or desert,and consisteth in a particular power or ability for that whereof he is said to be worthy;which particular ability is usually named fitness,or aptitude.
For he is worthiest to be a commander,to be a judge,or to have any other charge,that is best fitted with the qualities required to the well discharging of it;and worthiest of riches,that has the qualities most requisite for the well using of them:any of which qualities being absent,one may nevertheless be a worthy man,and valuable for something else.Again,a man may be worthy of riches,office,and employment that nevertheless can plead no right to have it before another,and therefore cannot be said to merit or deserve it.
For merit presupposeth a right,and that the thing deserved is due by promise,of which I shall say more hereafter when I shall speak of contracts.