Compensation, n.
Etymology: [L. compensatio a weighing, a balancing of accounts.]
1. The act or principle of compensating. Emerson.
2. That which constitutes, or is regarded as, an equivalent; that which makes good the lack or variation of something else; that which compensates for loss or privation; amends; remuneration; recompense. The parliament which dissolved the monastic foundations . . . vouchsafed not a word toward securing the slightest compensation to the dispossessed owners. Hallam. No pecuniary compensation can possibly reward them. Burke.
3. (Law) (a) The extinction of debts of which two persons are reciprocally debtors by the credits of which they are reciprocally creditors; the payment of a debt by a credit of equal amount; a set-off. Bouvier. Wharton. (b) A recompense or reward for some loss or service. (c) An equivalent stipulated for in contracts for the sale of real eatate, in which it is customary to privide that errors in description, etc., shall not avoid, but shall be the subject of compensation. Compensation balance, or Compensated balance, a kind of balance wheel for a timepiece. The rim is usually made of two different expansibility under changes of temperature, so arranged as to counteract each other and preserve uniformity of movement. -- Compensation pendulum. See Pendulum.
Syn. -- Recompense; reward; indemnification; consideration; requital; satisfaction; set-off.
Shades of meaning
Fernald has no entry of its own for compensation; he lists it under pay.
Where he writes about it:
Compensation is a comprehensive word signifying a return for a service done. — from pay
Recompense is a still wider and loftier word, with less suggestion of calculation and market value; there are services for which affection and gratitude are the sole and sufficient recompense; earnings, fees, hire, pay, salary, and wages are forms of compensation and may be included in compensation, remuneration, or recompense. — from pay