Note 338 — Chapter V · THE MORALITY OF CARD-PLAYING.

Boswell's Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides. The following anecdote respecting Locke is related by Le Clerc. Three or four men of rank met him by appointment at the house of Lord Ashley, afterwards Earl of Shaftesbury, rather for the sake of mutual entertainment than for business. After mutual compliments had passed, and before there had been any time for conversation, cards were introduced, and the visitors sat down to play. Mr. Locke, after looking on a while, drew out his tablets and sat down to write. One of the company at length observing how he was employed, asked him what he was writing. "My lord," replied he, "I am endeavouring to profit as much as I can from your company; for having impatiently longed to be present at a meeting of the most sensible and most witty men of the day, and having at last that good fortune, I thought that I could not do better than write down your conversation; I have indeed here put down the substance of what has been said for the last hour or two." The satire was immediately felt; the players quitted the game, and after amusing themselves for a while in retouching and enlarging what Mr. Locke had set down, spent the remainder of the day in more worthy conversation.—Eloge de Mr. Locke dans la Bibliothèque Choisie, tom. vi, p. 357.