The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1871-12-21
Sleep Enough.

plaCeQC OF SeUSlDle. n SiSdG Hhauy VI '.o'o
have concluded that it is better to become allies
of Nature than to fight her and repel all her
kindly aid Perhaps the physicians we're al
ways wise (they looked wise and only yielded
to popular prejudice in their sangrado practice
and their rigorous counsel. We have all been
taught there is merit in wasting as few hours as
possible in sleep, and that early rising is one
of the cardinal virtucs-admitting for the
Protestant moment that cardinals have virtues.
We have all been educated to believe that the
time given to the bed is lost, and that we gain
all the hours we steal from it. Children have
been taught that prompt rising in the morning
is beautiful thing.
am not sorry, therefore, that one of the
medical faculty, DR.. Hall, has had the good
sense to tell the world that children until the
age of eighteen, and old and feeble people,
land he might as well have said everybody
need ten hours sleep, and that bouncing sud.
denly oat of bed in the morning is as hurtful
as it is disagreeable; that fifteen or twenty
minutes spent in gradually waking up, stretch
ing the limbs, and letting the blood slowly re-
sumo its wonted circulation is time well spent
For the sudden sending of the blood to the
heart is severe shock, and the person who gets
up in this hasty and reckless manner is certain
to be drowsy by mid day, unless he or she is an
editor or belle, and does not get up till after
noon. I concur in this in fact always knew
that it was true; and think, further that pull
ing anybody out of bed ought to be States
prison offense, and doubt not that conviction
for it could be had before any of our ordinary
sleepy juries, if they were wake enough to hear
the evidence.
Many people seem to think it is unbecomiDg
to sleep anywhere except in church and at
evening lectures. They speak of it as merit
that they do with SO few hours sleep at home.
This is one reason why there are so many stu
pid people in society-admitting for the argu-
ment that there are so many, they get up too
soon or too suddenly, and 80 are never fairly
awake all through, what seems to be stupidity
is really want Of sleep. A good many of the
sermons, and now and then an editorial, are
written up in this state of mind and even
fashionable people go gaping around. making
ySrping calls upon acquaintance who ought
to Be in bed and who wish the callers were.
The world is all astray about this matter OF
sleep, led away by nursery couplets about early
to rise, and the examples of Napoleon, Peter
the Great, and other military heroes, who are
reported to have been satisfied with an hour or
two of sleep snatched from the twenty-four,
taken on plank, while their half dozen scrib-
bling secretaries are not allowed to sleep at all.
Mr.. Abbott cannot make it appear that he had
much more than respect for the Ruler of the
Universe. These sleepless people have made
most of the mischief in the world. Catherine
de Medicis was, we believe, light sleeper.
George Washington on the contrary, took his
time. walked up the Father Of his Country by
degrees, got out of bed with deliberation, and
dressed himself with thoughtful slowness.-
What ridiculous idea it would be to think of
that great man as bouncing OUT of bed at the
first bell, and dressing himself as if there was
a fire next door.
The instinct of children against carly and
especially sudden rising is we'll founded; and
it is pleasant to have the learned faculty con-
firm long and growing conviction that 1t IS
not sin to lie in bed till the second bell rings.
1t is the experience of the majority of people
that the most delicious moments OF the whole
day are those when they ought to get up, and
do not.
Hereafter let them linger in this delightful
borderland with quiet conscience. Nature Is
about to be vindicated by the scientists. Ii the
whole of life could be like that brief interval
between half awaking and getting out into the
cold world-that rare space of time when duty
calls so family that there is a sweet delight in
letting it call before conscience is aroused at all
one might like to revise the hymn-book and
live alway. We have been now for several
thousand years going to the ant and getting
away from the sluggard to that degree that we
have developed very nervous condition: 10
say nothing of being defrauded of our rights,
and of the legitimate and healthy luxury OF
sleeping long and waking up slowly, as plants
do, no doubt many of the nervous diseases that
are attributed to stock gambling, tobacco, and
unreouitted love, are due TO want Of sufficient
sleep, from childhood up.
1t is not an idle fancy that we moderns DO
not sleep enough. 1t is perhaps right to shoot
soldiers. who are hired for that purpose, for
sleeping at their posts. 1t disciplines them (;
but it might be better to relieve guard oftener
and send them to bed. Yet civilians generally
ought to be lectured for sleeping too little. All
the passages in school books about early rising
should be stricken out, and there should be
verses promising moderate competence as the
reward of sleeping enough and coming out OF
sleep by degrees. In old times perhaps it did
not matter so much, when the world was less
busy, and there was less strain upon the facul-
ties during the waking hours But every one
can see now that the world is red hot with
money-getting and vast enterprises and politics
and ritnalism, and all sorts of rights, patent
and some that are not so patent, and teyerlsh
literature and, in order to bear the wear and
carry the load of it, man needs to sleep more
hours than he did when he only rose to eat and
drink, and hunt the wild boar, and slay few
Of his his neighbors before an early dinner. But
we do not sleep as much as the former genera
tions did, who had less to do. We are bccom-
ing more and more wakeful, so that we cannot
sleep soundly in the season we give to rest 1t
is a nervous wakefulness, however, and not the
full vigor of all the powers which should result
from the proper rest of the system.
No one can be at his best in any hour unless
he has given as many hours to solid sleep as MS
the exactions of society keep most of us out Of
bed numerically, and in time we get jadedly
used to the unnatural life, and take credit to
ourselves that we can do with the fewest hours
of sleep. 1t is great mistake. There have
been great men who have been able to accom-
plish q great amount of work with little sleep