Gentleman

Gentleman seems to have been always used in a vaguer and more general sense than Esquire to denote one whose birth, wealth, or good breeding gave him a superior social position. There remain "titles of gentility" granted by Richard II. and Henry VI., but these apparently conferred the rank of Esquire. The name could be applied to anyone above the rank of yeoman, and there is no ground for supposing that" it ever had any more definite and restricted meaning. As now employed, it. usually implies both that the individual described is more or less refined, and tliat his parents occupied a certain position in society, but it is sometimes used to convey only one of these two notions.