We talked of gaming, and animadverted on it with severity.  Johnson.  ’Nay, gentlemen, let us not aggravate the matter.  It is not roguery to play with a man who is ignorant of the game, while you are master of it, and so win his money; for he thinks he can play better than you, as you think you can play better than he; and the superiour skill carries it.’  Erskine.  ‘He is a fool, but you are not a rogue.’  Johnson.  ’That’s much about the truth, Sir.  It must be considered, that a man who only does what every one of the society to which he belongs would do, is not a dishonest man.  In the republick of Sparta, it was agreed, that stealing was not dishonourable, if not discovered.  I do not commend a society where there is an agreement that what would not otherwise be fair, shall be fair; but I maintain, that an individual of any society, who practises what is allowed, is not a dishonest man.’  Boswell.  ’So then, Sir, you do not think ill of a man who wins perhaps forty thousand pounds in a winter?’ Johnson.  ’Sir, I do not call a gamester a dishonest man; but I call him an unsocial man, an unprofitable man.  Gaming is a mode of transferring property without producing any intermediate good.  Trade gives employment to numbers, and so produces intermediate good.’

On Thursday, April 9, I called on him to beg he would go and dine with me at the Mitre tavern.  He had resolved not to dine at all this day, I know not for what reason; and I was so unwilling to be deprived of his company, that I was content to submit to suffer a want, which was at first somewhat painful, but he soon made me forget it; and a man is always pleased with himself when he finds his intellectual inclinations predominate.

He observed, that to reason philosophically on the nature of prayer, was very unprofitable.

Talking of ghosts, he said, he knew one friend, who was an honest man and a sensible man, who told him he had seen a ghost, old Mr. Edward Cave, the printer at St. John’s Gate.  He said, Mr. Cave did not like to talk of it, and seemed to be in great horrour whenever it was mentioned.  Boswell.  ‘Pray, Sir, what did he say was the appearance?’ Johnson.  ’Why, Sir, something of a shadowy being.’

On Friday, April 10, I dined with him at General Oglethorpe’s, where we found Dr. Goldsmith.

I started the question whether duelling was consistent with moral duty.  The brave old General fired at this, and said, with a lofty air, ‘Undoubtedly a man has a right to defend his honour.’  Goldsmith. (turning to me,) ’I ask you first, Sir, what would you do if you were affronted?’ I answered I should think it necessary to fight.  ’Why then, (replied Goldsmith,) that solves the question.’  Johnson.  ’No, Sir, it does not solve the question.  It does not follow that what a man would do is therefore right.’  I said, I wished to have it settled, whether duelling was contrary to the laws of Christianity.  Johnson