104 SLEEP A8 A FACTOR IN HEALTH. 



of the domestic circle, surrounded by loving wives and happy chil. 

 dren, instead of living bachelors, repelled by the fear of being yoked 

 to extravagant, lazy, sickly wives, and by visions of starving, sickly 

 and dying children. 



The Exercise that Produces Health But the exercise 

 which is taken to cure headache and its kindred evils may sometimes 

 cause that very thing. This happens when the exercise is not taken 

 regularly and a single opportunity is made too much of, and the 

 person unaccustomed to it practices it too long or too vigorously. 

 The fact is that out-door exercise gives the keenest physical enjoy- 

 ment, and if, for instance, a young girl who has been closely shut 

 up in the house has a chance to take exercise in a pleasant way she 

 is very likely to go too far, and the troubles which follow the over- 

 exertion often cause the too careful mother to conclude that her 

 delicate child is not fit to be out doors at all, when in fact being 

 out regularly in good weather is the thing above all others she most 

 needs. 



SLEEP AS A FACTOR IN HEALTH. 



Very few people understand and still fewer appreciate the im- 

 portance of sound, regular, timely and refreshing sleep. Tissue- 

 waste, the consumption of the entire physical structure, from brain 

 to cuticle, goes on during all our waking hours. Sleep is the time 

 and the only time in which those reparative processes which may 

 overcome all this waste can take place. To lose sleep is, therefore, 

 to lose vital stamina, strength, health, and finally life itself. Hun- 

 ger and thirst are thought to be the most painful modes of death ; 

 but the ingenuity of despotism has, we are given to understand, 

 within a few years past, discovered one still more torturing and 

 that is death by the loss of sleep. The helpless wretch is put 

 under the charge of cruel keepers, who never allow him, from the 

 date of his sentence, to close his eyes in slumber. He rages, 

 threatens, begs for death in any form longs for impalement or any 

 active and violent form of torture raves, blasphemes, and so at 

 last dies in agonies unspeakable. 



Sleep a Force-Giver Sleep is, not only the tissue-builder, 

 but the force-giver. Our strength and alacrity for daily tasks, 

 whether of the mind or body, depend upon the quality and 

 amount of our daily sleep; and the amount and quality of the sleep 

 required depend not only upon the severity of those tasks, but 

 upon the perfection of the organism with which we pursue them. 

 The higher the capacity, the more and better is the sleep required. 

 Small and inactive brains, like small and inactive bodies, may per- 

 form their functions with much less rest than large and active ones. 

 The sleep required for health is in proportion to the physical and 

 mental strength of the individual. An erroneous notion prevails 



