94. WONDERS OF ORGANIC LIFE. 



CHAPTER IV. 



REPOSE, OR SLEEP. 



Among the many points which serve to draw a 

 wide line of separation between organic beings 

 and inorganic matter, there are some which, 

 from the nature of our subject, claim our 

 special notice. And first, we would revert to 

 that peculiar state of repose necessary for the 

 refreshment of the living being, exhausted by 

 thought, by toil, by bodily exertion, which we 

 term sleep. True sleep, if we use the word in 

 a restricted sense, is perhaps peculiar only to 

 mammalia and birds ; nevertheless, the lower 

 animals, as reptiles, fishes, insects, and probably 

 others lower in the scale of creation, seek for 

 repose, and pass into a temporary condition of 

 partial lethargy, or deadness to things around 

 them. In some, this condition is assumed on 

 the approach of night ; others are awake during 

 the night, and pass the day in slumber. 



If we extend the meaning of the term sleep, 

 then must it be allowed that plants, destitute as 

 they are of nerves, or of any of the organs of 

 the senses, undergo a peculiar state of repose — 

 in other words, they sleep. 



