ANIMALS. 



157 



trances to the brain, let us be contented with 

 simply enumerating the effects of sleep upon 

 the human constitution. 



In sleep, the whole nervous frame is re- 

 laxed, while the heart and the lungs seem 

 more forcibly exerted. This fuller circula- 

 tion produces also a swelling of the muscles, 

 as they always find who sleep with ligatures 

 on any part of their body. This increased 

 circulation also, may be considered as a kind 

 of exercise, which is continued through the 

 frame ; and by this, the perspiration becomes 

 more copious, although the appetite for food 

 is entirely taken away. Too much sleep 

 dulls the apprehension, weakens the memory, 

 and unfits the body for labour. On the con- 

 trary, sleep too much abridged, emaciates 

 the frame, produces melancholy, and con- 

 sumes the constitution. It requires some 

 care, therefore, to regulate the quantity of 

 sleep, and just to take as much as will com- 

 pletely restore nature, without oppressing it. 

 The poor, as Otway says, sleep little ; forced 

 by their situation, to lengthen out their labour 

 to their necessities, they have but a short inter- 

 val for this pleasing refreshment; and I have 

 ever been of opinion, that bodily labour de- 

 mands a less quantity of sleep than mental. 

 Labourers and artizans are generally satis- 

 fied with about seven hours; but I have 

 known some scholars who usually slept nine, 

 and perceived their faculties no way impaired 

 by oversleeping. 



The famous Philip Barrettiere, who was 

 considered as a prodigy of learning at the 

 age of fourteen, was known to sleep regularly 

 twelve hours in the twenty-four ; the extreme 

 activity of his mind, when awake, in some 

 measure called for an adequate alternation of 

 repose : and, I am apt to think, that when 

 students stint themselves in this particular, 

 they lessen the waking powers of the imagi- 

 nation, and weaken its most strenuous exer- 

 tions. Animals that seldom think, as was 

 said, can very easily dispense with sleep ; 

 and of men, such as think least, will, very 

 probably, be satisfied with the smallest share. 

 A life of study, it is well known, unfits the 

 body for receiving tin's gentle refreshment ; 

 tho approaches of sleep are driven off by 

 thinking: when, therefore, it comes at last, 

 we should not be too ready to interrupt its 



continuance. Sleep is, indeed, to some, a very 

 agreeable period of their existence: audit has 

 been a question in the schools, Which was most 

 happy, the man who was a beggar by night, 

 and a king by day ; or he who was a beggar 

 by day, and a king by night ? It is given in 

 favour of the nightly monarch, by him who 

 first started the question : " For the dream,*' 

 says he, " gives the full enjoyment of the dig- 

 nity, without its attendant inconveniences ; 

 while, on the other hand, the king, who sup- 

 poses himself degraded, feels all the misery 

 of his fallen fortune, without trying to find tho 

 comforts of his humble situation. Thus, by 

 day, both states have their peculiardistresses: 

 but, by night, the exalted beggar is perfectly 

 blessed, and the king completely miserable." 

 All this, however, is rather fanciful than just; 

 the pleasure dreams can give us, seldom 

 reaches to our waking pitch of happiness : 

 the mind often in the midst of its highest vi- 

 sionary satisfactions, demands of itself, whe- 

 ther it does not owe them to a dream ; and 

 frequently awakes with the reply. 



But it is seldom, except in cases of the 

 highest delight, or the most extreme uneasi- 

 ness, that the mind has power thus to disen- 

 gage itself from the dominion of fancy. In 

 the ordinary course of its operations, it sub- 

 mits to those numberless fantastic images that 

 succeed each other, and which, like many of 

 our waking thoughts, arc generally forgotten. 

 Of these, however, if any, by their oddity, or 

 their continuance, affect us strongly, they 

 are then remembered ; and there have 

 been some who felt their impressions so 

 strongly, as to mistake them for realities, 

 and to rank them among the past actions of 

 their lives. 



There are others upon whom dreams seem 

 to have a very different effect; and who, 

 without seeming to remember their impres- 

 sions the next morning, have yet shown, by 

 their actions during sleep, that they were 

 very powerfully impelled by their dominion. 

 We have numberless instances of such per- 

 sons who, while asleep, have performed many 

 of the ordinary duties to which they had 

 been accustomed when waking; and, with a 

 ridiculous industry, have completed by night, 

 what they failed doing by day. We are told, 

 in the German Ephcmcrides, of a young stu- 

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