The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1869-12-25
dB0 UT DREAMG.
The Border Land OF Drenms--A Curious
Anulysis-IIow to Sleep.

What Professor Balm calls Hthc yoluminous
pleasure Of falling asleep" Is so very rarely
analyzed by men Of science, that some very
odd notions arc abroad upon the subject. One
OF these is, that you cannot fall asleep until
you cease thinking. The common recipe for
for the securing OF slccp-to go on counting
hundred after hundred until you become i'll
scnsiblc--is said to be Invaluable, because II is
supposed to exercise thought. In fact, It does
nothing OF the kind. 1t Is possible TO go OH
counting mechanically while the mind is busy
in quite other directions, drawing imaginary
pictures, recalling the events OF the dny, and
so forth. The monotony of counting certainly
tends to induce sleep, and 30 inr lessons the
chances OF the obtrrsion OF conscious thought.
But the notion that one must cease 10 ih!u];
before one can sleep Is only vulgar error.
Certain operations OF the mind-of memory,
reason, Judgment, and, above all, of imaslna-
tion-do moi cease even after actual sleep has
set in.
In sleep we remember and call up before
rB persons long dead we reason with them.
and some times, by an inexplicable mental
freak, we allow them TO puzzle and perplcx us
they have To explain TO ns, and Judge of their
appearance and conduct; and we Imagine an
lncessant panorama Of action in which they
are engaged. Frequently the mental products
OF sleep are next day available to us. We are
possessed at the cpigram which one or other
of the characters In the sleep-drama uttered
We can remember the eXtravagant vagaries
and gorgeous spectacular effects or the sleep
scenery-the castles OF mllk-whilc cloud. tic
seas OF liquid fire, the gardens In which every
flower has heart OF diamonds. And as ail
these intellectual processes must have their
corrciaiiye corr physical effects, it Is Just probable
lhat the bialn-tnntcrlal gets no rest at all: that
The constant transmutation o. substance in the
cerebral cells, which Psychologists postulatc.
goes on by night rs by day. Some great and
rttical differences there undoubtedly aro bu-
tween Inc thinking OF wakefniness and the
thinking OF sleep; In the Inter, for example,
we are never conscious that we are thinking,
and our thonghts are entirely beyond the d..
recilOn Of the Will.
Int there her lis, Is remarkably curious period
Is only half consciousness of thought, and I'm
which our thinking Is, to certain extent.
subject TO yolition. The men and women
nnd The scenes we behold during this period
nave none OF tho fine independence and ON,
plctcncss of the creations of dreams. The
dream figures are like tho impossible figures
which tho magic lantern shows us; tho figures
lIlat haunt this transitional state are IKE real
men and women seen through piece OF
bottle-glass. During this period we still prc-
serve some notions of consistency and ngrec-
ment; III tile land OF dreams impOsslbilIty has
pecome natural. Take the very case of count
ing numbers. In dream you feel copfldent
Ihat you can count hundred backwards and
forwards o the same time, and you may hnye
Vague ph ;slcal Impression that your organ
OF calculation Is a piece Of India rubber
which has been painfully stretched TO the OK
treincs of ihe hundred, md that Its two points
VIII somehow cross each other when you (who
arc outside OF the process) arrive at fny. This
nonsense Is impossible In that confused and
sun c1EScious period of which we speak. Then
we we SIN M have the resolution TO go on counting
nine, ten, In constant succession. In a silort
time we become vaguely aware that Dino has
cropped out. Then eight drops out. Each
nmc we come to seven We make sudden
were an unnecessary mental EFFORT. Every
decade is now represented by one, two, three,
four, five, SIX, seven, ten.