Too Little Sleep

On this subject, Dr. J. C. Jacksnn, celebrated as a water cure practitioner in Western New York, says: As a habk and fashion witb our people, we sleep too little. It is admitted by all whó are competent to spenk on the subjeet, that the people j of the Unitbd States, froin day to day, not only do not get sufficient sleep, but they do not get sufficient rest. By the preponderance of the nervous over the vital temperament, they need all the recuperating benefits which sleep can offer during each night is it passes. A far better ruje woulcl be to get at least eight hours' sleep, and, ineluding sleep, ten hours' of reeumbent rest. It is u sad mistako that some make, who suppose themeelves qualified to speak on the subject, in affirming that persons of a highly-wrought, nervous temperament, need - as compared with Ihose of a more lymphatic or stolid organization - less sleep. The truth is, that where power is expended with great rapidity, by a constitutional law, it is regatheied slowly; the reaction, after a while, demanding much more time for the gatheiïng up of new force, than thu direct efiort demanda in expending that force. Thus, a man of the nervoua temperament, aíter he has establisned a habit of over doing, recovers from the effect of such overaction much more slowly than a man of different temperament would, if the balance between hia power to do and bis power to rest isr destroyed. Aa between the nervous and lymphatic temperaments, tberefore, where excess of work is demandad, it will be 6een that, at the close of the day's labor, whether it has been of muscle or thought, the man of nervous tempera ment, who is tired, finds it diffioalt to fall asleep, sleeps perturbedly, wakei up excitedly, and is more apt thiin otherwise to resort to stirnulants to place himself in conditions of pleasurable activity. Wbile the man of lym phatic temperament, when tircd, falls asleep, sleeps soundly and uninterruptedly, and wakes up in tho morning a new man. The i'acts are against the theory that nervous temperaments recupérate quickly from the fatigue to which their possessors are subjected. Three-fourths of our drunkards are from the ranks of the men of nervous temperuments. Almost all opiumeaters in our country - and their name is legión - are persons of the nervous or nervous-sanguine temperaments. - Almost all the men in the country who become the victima of narcotic drugmedication, are of the nervous or nervoua-sanguine temperaments. Dr Cornell, of Philadelphia, in The Ediicatur, gives the following opinión corroborativo of tho above, as an explanation of the frequency of iusamty. ti.n save: "The riiost frequent and immediate muse f insaiiity, aud ont of' the most important to guard agaiust, is the want of sleep. Ind'ed, so raroly do we sea a recent case oi iosunity that is uot preceded by want f sleep, that it is regarded au almost a uure precursor of mental derangement NotwithPtanding strong hereditary predisposition, if the ill sleep well they will not becorne insane. Ño advice is so good, therefore, to those who have recovered irora an attack, or to ihose wh are in delicate health, as that of Hecuring, by all means, sound, regular, and refreshing sleep." 'And," says Dr. Spicer, "there ia no faet more clearly establised in the physiology, of man than this, that the brain expands ts energiea and itself during the hours of wakefulness, and that these are recuperated during sleep; if the recuperation does not equal the expenditure, the brain witheis - this is I insanity. Thus it is that, in early : English history, persons who vvhere condemned to death by being prevented from sleeping, always died raving ; maniacs; thus it is also, that those who starve to death become insane - the brain is not nourished, and they cannot sleep.