42 HOW TO PROCURE SLEEP, 



reveal the world to our observation before the 

 clock shall number another. But even then, we 

 have feeling, and the very darkness makes sound 

 more audible. Yet still, our situation is painful, 

 and though we are fatigued and exhausted, we 

 want something; and cannot, on that account, 

 find repose. If we rise, and open the casement, 

 and see the moon among the light clouds in the 

 west, or the stars and planets in the clear sky, or 

 the summer lightning playing from cloud to cloud; 

 or if we even see the lamps in the street, or the 

 outlines of the buildings, or of trees and hills, 

 how dimly soever, against the sky; we feel our 

 connexion with nature, even that little of obser- 

 vation dispels the reverie of the night, our minds 

 are tranquillized, we return to bed renovated in 

 our minds, and refreshed in our bodies ; and that 

 sleep which fled us when we before sought it with 

 diligence, now comes unbidden, because we have 

 wooed it in the right way by the observation of 

 nature. 



If we loiter on the sleepless pillow, and have 

 not resolution enough to get up, then our torment 

 lasts till the dawn has so far advanced as that we 

 can see distinctly, or till the beams of the early 

 sun are breaking in through the chink of the 

 shutters, or the opening of the curtains; but soon 

 after even the articles of the room are revealed to 

 our observation, our minds are tranquillized, and 

 we glide into dozing slumber. 



Even those contrivances to which we resort for 

 the purpose of procuring sleep, are proofs, that 

 observation is the means by which we obtain that 

 refreshment. When the mother stills her infant 

 to repose, it is not by silence, which, as it is the 



