Sooner or later we all sit down to the banquet of consequences.

The popular wording about a "banquet of consequences" appears to be a later rephrasing that was widely circulated in the 20th century and then repeatedly credited to Stevenson. Stevenson’s closest known wording is from his 1884 essay "Old Mortality", where he uses the metaphor "game of consequences" in a passage about the value of books in preparing people for real life.

Actions and choices may not produce immediate results, but outcomes eventually arrive and must be faced; the metaphor suggests that consequences are unavoidable and, in time, everyone must "take their seat" and receive what their behavior has set in motion.

"...shadowing the complexity of that game of consequences to which we all sit down, the hanger-back not least."

Sooner or later we all sit down to the banquet of consequences.

Everybody, sooner or later, sits down to a banquet of consequences.

Everybody, soon or late, sits down to a banquet of consequences.