_Detur digno_ is a maxim which will make men do their best to merit rewards; every man can find courage within his heart to be worthy; but _detur digniori_ is a fearful law for such a profession as the Civil Service.

What worth can make a man safe against the possible greater worth which will come treading on his heels?
The spirit of the age raises, from year to year, to a higher level the standard of education.

The prodigy of 1857, who is now destroying all the hopes of the man who was well enough in 1855, will be a dunce to the tyro of 1860.
There were three or four in the Weights and Measures who felt all this with the keenest anxiety.

The fact of their being there, and of their having passed the scrutiny of Mr.Hardlines, was proof enough that they were men of high attainments; but then the question arose to them and others whether they were men exactly of those attainments which were _now_ most required.

Who is to say what shall constitute the merits of the _dignior_?
It may one day be conic sections, another Greek iambics, and a third German philosophy.