CHAPTER X
OF POWER, WORTH, DIGNITY, HONOUR AND WORTHINESS

THE POWER of a man, to take it universally, is his present means
to obtain some future apparent good, and is either original or
instrumental.
Natural power is the eminence of the faculties of body, or mind;
as extraordinary strength, form, prudence, arts, eloquence,
liberality, nobility. Instrumental are those powers which, acquired by
these, or by fortune, are means and instruments to acquire more; as
riches, reputation, friends, and the secret working of God, which
men call good luck. For the nature of power is, in this point, like to
fame, increasing as it proceeds; or like the motion of heavy bodies,
which, the further they go, make still the more haste.
The greatest of human powers is that which is compounded of the
powers of most men, united by consent, in one person, natural or
civil, that has the use of all their powers depending on his will;
such as is the power of a Commonwealth: or depending on the wills of
each particular; such as is the power of a faction, or of diverse.
factions leagued. Therefore to have servants is power; to have friends
is power: for they are strengths united.
Also, riches joined with liberality is power; because it procureth
friends and servants: without liberality, not so; because in this case
they defend not, but expose men to envy, as a prey.
Reputation of power is power; because it draweth with it the
adherence of those that need protection.
So is reputation of love of a man's country, called popularity,
for the same reason.
Also, what quality soever maketh a man beloved or feared of many, or
the reputation of such quality, is power; because it is a means to
have the assistance and service of many.
Good success is power; because it maketh reputation of wisdom or
good fortune, which makes men either fear him or rely on him.
Affability of men already in power is increase of power; because
it gaineth love.
Reputation of prudence in the conduct of peace or war is power;
because to prudent men we commit the government of ourselves more
willingly than to others.
Nobility is power, not in all places, but only in those
Commonwealths where it has privileges; for in such privileges
consisteth their power.
Eloquence is power; because it is seeming prudence.
Form is power; because being a promise of good, it recommendeth
men to the favour of women and strangers.
The sciences are small powers; because not eminent, and therefore,
not acknowledged in any man; nor are at all, but in a few, and in
them, but of a few things. For science is of that nature, as none
can understand it to be, but such as in a good measure have attained
it.
Arts of public use, as fortification, making of engines, and other
instruments of war, because they confer to defence and victory, are
power; and though the true mother of them be science, namely, the
mathematics yet, because they are brought into the light by the hand
of the artificer, they be esteemed (the midwife passing with the
vulgar for the mother) as his issue.
The value or worth of a man is, as of all other things, his price;
that is to say, so much as would be given for the use of his power,
and therefore is not absolute, but a thing dependent on the need and
judgement of another. An able conductor of soldiers is of great
price in time of war present or imminent, but in peace not so. A
learned and uncorrupt judge is much worth in time of peace, but not so
much in war. And as in other things, so in men, not the seller, but
the buyer determines the price. For let a man, as most men do, rate
themselves at the highest value they can, yet their true value is no
more than it is esteemed by others.
The manifestation of the value we set on one another is that which
is commonly called honouring and dishonouring. To value a man at a
high rate is to honour him; at a low rate is to dishonour him. But
high and low, in this case, is to be understood by comparison to the
rate that each man setteth on himself.
The public worth of a man, which is the value set on him by the
Commonwealth, is that which men commonly call dignity. And this
value of him by the Commonwealth is understood by offices of
command, judicature, public employment; or by names and titles
introduced for distinction of such value.
To pray to another for aid of any kind is to honour; because a
sign we have an opinion he has power to help; and the more difficult
the aid is, the more is the honour.
To obey s to honour; because no man obeys them who they think have
no power to help or hurt them. And consequently to disobey is to
dishonour.
To give great gifts to a man is to honour him; because it is
buying of protection, and acknowledging of power. To give little gifts
is to dishonour; because it is but alms, and signifies an opinion of
the need of small helps.
To be sedulous in promoting another's good, also to flatter, is to
honour; as a sign we seek his protection or aid. To neglect is to
dishonour.
To give way or place to another, in any commodity, is to honour;
being a confession of greater power. To arrogate is to dishonour.
To show any sign of love or fear of another is honour; for both to
love and to fear is to value. To contemn, or less to love or fear than
he expects, is to dishonour; for it is undervaluing.
To praise, magnify, or call happy is to honour; because nothing
but goodness, power, and felicity is valued. To revile, mock, or
pity is to dishonour.
To speak to another with consideration, to appear before him with
decency and humility, is to honour him; as signs of fear to offend. To
speak to him rashly, to do anything before him obscenely, slovenly,
impudently is to dishonour.
To believe, to trust, to rely on another, is to honour him; sign
of opinion of his virtue and power. To distrust, or not believe, is to
dishonour.
To hearken to a man's counsel, or discourse of what kind soever,
is to honour; as a sign we think him wise, or eloquent, or witty. To
sleep, or go forth, or talk the while, is to dishonour.
To do those things to another which he takes for signs of honour, or
which the law or custom makes so, is to honour; because in approving
the honour done by others, he acknowledgeth the power which others
acknowledge. To refuse to do them is to dishonour.
To agree with in opinion is to honour; as being a sign of
approving his judgement and wisdom. To dissent is dishonour, and an
upbraiding of error, and, if the dissent be in many things, of folly.
To imitate is to honour; for it is vehemently to approve. To imitate
one's enemy is to dishonour.
To honour those another honours is to honour him; as a sign of
approbation of his judgement. To honour his enemies is to dishonour
him.
To employ in counsel, or in actions of difficulty, is to honour;
as a sign of opinion of his wisdom or other power. To deny
employment in the same cases to those that seek it is to dishonour.
All these ways of honouring are natural, and as well within, as
without Commonwealths. But in Commonwealths where he or they that have
the supreme authority can make whatsoever they please to stand for
signs of honour, there be other honours.
A sovereign doth honour a subject with whatsoever title, or
office, or employment, or action that he himself will have taken for a
sign of his will to honour him.
The king of Persia honoured Mordecai when he appointed he should
be conducted through the streets in the king's garment, upon one of
the king's horses, with a crown on his head, and a prince before
him, proclaiming, "Thus shall it be done to him that the king will
honour." And yet another king of Persia, or the same another time,
to one that demanded for some great service to wear one of the
king's robes, gave him leave so to do; but with this addition, that he
should wear it as the king's fool; and then it was dishonour. So
that of civil honour, the fountain is in the person of the
Commonwealth, and dependeth on the will of the sovereign, and is
therefore temporary and called civil honour; such as are magistracy,
offices, titles, and in some places coats and scutcheons painted:
and men honour such as have them, as having so many signs of favour in
the Commonwealth, which favour is power.
Honourable is whatsoever possession, action, or quality is an
argument and sign of power.
And therefore to be honoured, loved, or feared of many is
honourable, as arguments of power. To be honoured of few or none,
dishonourable.
Dominion and victory is honourable because acquired by power; and
servitude, for need or fear, is dishonourable.
Good fortune, if lasting, honourable; as a sign of the favour of
God. Ill and losses, dishonourable. Riches are honourable, for they
are power. Poverty, dishonourable. Magnanimity, liberality, hope,
courage, confidence, are honourable; for they proceed from the
conscience of power. Pusillanimity, parsimony, fear, diffidence, are
dishonourable.
Timely resolution, or determination of what a man is to do, is
honourable, as being the contempt of small difficulties and dangers.
And irresolution, dishonourable, as a sign of too much valuing of
little impediments and little advantages: for when a man has weighed
things as long as the time permits, and resolves not, the difference
of weight is but little; and therefore if he resolve not, he
overvalues little things, which is pusillanimity.
All actions and speeches that proceed, or seem to proceed, from much
experience, science, discretion, or wit are honourable; for all
these are powers. Actions or words that proceed from error, ignorance,
or folly, dishonourable.
Gravity, as far forth as it seems to proceed from a mind employed on
something else, is honourable; because employment is a sign of
power. But if it seem to proceed from a purpose to appear grave, it is
dishonourable. For the gravity of the former is like the steadiness of
a ship laden with merchandise; but of the like the steadiness of a
ship ballasted with sand and other trash.
To be conspicuous, that is to say, to be known, for wealth,
office, great actions, or any eminent good is honourable; as a sign of
the power for which he is conspicuous. On the contrary, obscurity is
dishonourable.
To be descended from conspicuous parents is honourable; because they
the more easily attain the aids and friends of their ancestors. On the
contrary, to be descended from obscure parentage is dishonourable.
Actions proceeding from equity, joined with loss, are honourable; as
signs of magnanimity: for magnanimity is a sign of power. On the
contrary, craft, shifting, neglect of equity, is dishonourable.
Covetousness of great riches, and ambition of great honours, are
honourable; as signs of power to obtain them. Covetousness, and
ambition of little gains, or preferments, is dishonourable.
Nor does it alter the case of honour whether an action (so it be
great and difficult, and consequently a sign of much power) be just or
unjust: for honour consisteth only in the opinion of power. Therefore,
the ancient heathen did not think they dishonoured, but greatly
honoured the gods, when they introduced them in their poems committing
rapes, thefts, and other great, but unjust or unclean acts; in so much
as nothing is so much celebrated in Jupiter as his adulteries; nor
in Mercury as his frauds and thefts; of whose praises, in a hymn of
Homer, the greatest is this, that being born in the morning, he had
invented music at noon, and before night stolen away the cattle of
Apollo from his herdsmen.
Also amongst men, till there were constituted great Commonwealths,
it was thought no dishonour to be a pirate, or a highway thief; but
rather a lawful trade, not only amongst the Greeks, but also amongst
all other nations; as is manifest by the of ancient time. And at
this day, in this part of the world, private duels are, and always
will be, honourable, though unlawful, till such time as there shall be
honour ordained for them that refuse, and ignominy for them that
make the challenge. For duels also are many times effects of
courage, and the ground of courage is always strength or skill,
which are power; though for the most part they be effects of rash
speaking, and of the fear of dishonour, in one or both the combatants;
who, engaged by rashness, are driven into the lists to avoid disgrace.
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.