Richard L. Evans wrote:
Since Emerson wrote his essay on compensation, it has been difficult to say anything new on the subject. But for a generation that may have forgotten, and a generation that may not yet have become acquainted with it, perhaps some sentences could well be recalled, among them, these:
“The world looks like a mathematical equation, which, turn it how you will, balances itself.” . . .
“A certain compensation balances every gift and every defect.”. . . “Things refuse to be mismanaged long.” . . . “You cannot go wrong without suffering wrong.” . . . “If you tax too high the revenue will yield nothing.” . . . “In labor as in life, there can be no cheating. The thief steals from self. The swindler swindles self.” . . . “Do the thing and you shall have the power: but they who do not the thing have not the power.”. . . “We suffer all our life long, under the foolish superstition that we can be cheated. But it is impossible to be cheated by anyone but ourselves.”90
So much for Emerson and his essay. But this one thought further we should like to leave: There are some in the world who are willing, some less willing, some unwilling—to work, to serve, to give of themselves. And one of the lessons we earnestly need to remember is that life does not give its choicest blessings and satisfactions to those who deliberately withhold helpfulness and usefulness.
It is true that a willing person sometimes seems to be imposed upon, but for every useful part they perform they are somehow richly rewarded. Aside from all else, they feel good. . . .; while a stingy, unwilling nature, which gives only grudgingly, is grudgingly rewarded.
No doubt there will be some cynicism concerning this subject. And it would be difficult to prove to the satisfaction of the cynical just how, precisely, a person would be paid for every service, for every effort, for every activity. We cannot always tell the cynical precisely how nature will reward or how the Lord God will return good for good; but as surely as we live, he who withholds his hand from service, he who isn’t going to do one stroke more than what he feels is his so-called fair share, is going to miss more than he can calculate. As surely as we live, he who shirks will shrivel inside himself, and he who hides his light loses light. “Every virtue is rewarded, every wrong redressed, in silence and certainty.”90 ~Richard L Evans
