On Outsmarting Other Men

There is another side to the subject of someone to trust, someone to be safe with, and that

is this: The person who is foolish enough to suppose that he can out-smart other men, that

he can out-smart a law, or a lock, or an audit, or a safety system is simply out-smarting himself.

It is true that a person might at first conceal something. The swindler, the deceiver, the plotter

always has the first advantage because he knows beforehand what he is plotting. A person who

is planning embezzlement, has some advantage in timing, because no one else knows what he

has done until after he has done it. But even though the defrauder, or thief, has a head start, no

one, in any act of life, can, for very long, count on concealment. And for a man to suppose that

he can out-smart other men would seem to require a peculiar kind of consent (or stupidity), for

what he is saying, in a sense, is this: that he has thought of something that others haven’t

thought of, or couldn’t think of. But anyone who is contemplating some fraud, some deception,

some evil or unworthy act had just as well rule out the possibility of secrecy or concealment,

because the same kind of mind that can out-smart other men can also catch the kind of mind

that can out-smart other men. Thus the cycle completes itself as the out-smarter is out-

smarted. “There is no such thing as concealment,” Emerson said. “Commit a crime, and the

earth is made of glass. Commit a crime, and it seems as if a coat of snow fell on the ground,

such as reveals… the track of every partridge and fox and squirrel… You cannot… wipe out the

foot-track, you cannot draw up the ladder, so as to leave no… clue. Always some damning

circumstance transpires” As young people enter upon careers and face their own future, we

would implant this in their hearts as one of the greatest lessons of life: play it straight and

clean, with honor and honesty, with no deception, no concealment, no taking of anything that

isn’t yours, no compromising of any principle. Otherwise there is always the long arm of the law

– and something we are fit to live with ourselves, whether or not we can sleep, whether or not

we can feel safe. This kind of peace, this kind of confidence, comes only as it is earned—for a

person cannot count on concealment.