640 MEALS MEDICINAL. 
but the embleme, or picture of the other; we are somewhat 
more than ourselves in our sleeps, and the slumber of the body 
seems to be but the waking of the soul. It is the litigation of 
sense, but the liberty of reason; and our waking conceptions 
do not match the fancies of our sleeps. We term sleep a death, 
and yet it is waking that kills us, and destroys those spirits that 
are the house of life; a death which Adam dyed before his 
mortality ; a death whereby we live a middle, and moderating 
point between life, and death; in fine, so like death I dare not 
trust it without my prayers, and a half adieu unto the world, 
and take my farewell in a colloquy with God. This is the 
dormative I take to bedward; I need no other Laudanum than 
this to make me sleep ; afterwards I close mine eyes in security, 
content to take my leave of the Sun, and sleep unto the Resurrec- 
tion.” In similar strain Charles Lamb has written (Popular 
Fallacies): “ It is good to have friends at court ; the abstracted 
media of dreams seem no ill introduction to that spiritual 
presence upon which in no long time we expect to be thrown; 
we are trying to know a little of the usages of that colony,— 
to learn the language, and the faces we shall meet with there, 
that we may be the less awkward at our first coming among 
them. We willingly call a phantom our fellow, as knowing we 
shall soon be of their dark companionship. Therefore we 
cherish dreams.” “ A word of admonition,” wrote Robert L. 
Stevenson, “is never out of place against working the young 
brain beyond its powers, or its endurance. We have all at our 
bedsides the box of the merchant Abudah, and, thank God! 
securely enough shut; but when a young man sacrifices sleep 
to labour let him have a care! he is tampering rashly with the 
lock.” “ Abudah ” (in the Tales of the Genii, 1765) “ is a wealthy 
merchant of Bagdad who sets out in quest of a talisman, which 
he is driven to seek by a little old hag who escapes from a chest. 
and haunts him every night, making his life sleepless, and 
wretched. He finds at last that the talisman which will free 
him from this hag (conscience) is ‘to fear God, and keep His 
commandments.’ ” 
On the other hand, it is contended by some competent 
authorities that too much sleep deadens the senses, and weakens 
the vitality; in favour of which view striking examples may 
be given of persons distinguished for energy of mind, and body, 
who have allowed themselves but little sleep throughout a long, 
