SLEEP AND ITS DERANGEMENTS. CHAPTER I. THE NECESSITY FOR SLEEP. THE state of general repose which accompanies sleep is of especial value to the organism in allowing the nutrition of the nervous tissue to go on at a greater rate than its destructive metamorphosis. The same effect is, of course, produced upon the other structures of the body; but this is not of so much importance as regards them, for while we are awake they all obtain a not inconsiderable amount of rest. Even those actions which are most continuous, such as respiration and the pulsation of the heart, have distinct periods of suspension. Thus, after the contraction and dilatation of the auricles and ventricles of the heart, there is an interval during which the organ is at rest. This amounts to onefourth of the time requisite to make one pulsation and begin another. During six hours of the twentyfour the heart is, therefore, in a state of complete repose. If we divide the respiratory act into three equal parts, one will be occupied in inspiration, one in expiration, and the other by a period of quiescence. During eight hours of the day, therefore, the muscles of respiration and the lungs are inactive. And so with the several glands. Each has its time for rest. And of the voluntary muscles, none, even during our most untiring waking moments, are kept in continued action. But for the brain there is no rest, except during sleep, and even this condition is, as we all know, only one of comparative quietude in many instances. So long as an individual is awake, there is not a single second of his life during which the brain is altogether inactive; and even while he is deprived by sleep of the power of volition, nearly every other faculty of the mind is capable of being exercised; and several of them, as the imagination and memory, for instance, are sometimes carried to a pitch of exaltation not ordinarily reached by direct and voluntary efforts. If it were not for the fact that all parts of the brain are not in action at the same time, and that thus some slight measure of repose is afforded, it would probably be impossible for the organ to maintain itself in a state of integrity. During wakefulness therefore the brain is constantly in action, though this action may be of such a character as not always to make us conscious of its performance. A great deal of the power of the brain is expended in the continuance of functional operations necessary to our well-being. During sleep these are altogether arrested or else very materially retarded in force and frequency. Many instances of what Dr. Carpenter very happily calls "unconscious cerebration" will suggest themselves to the reader. We frequently find suggestions occurring to us suddenly-suggestions which could only have arisen as the result of a train of ideas passing through our minds, but of which we have been unconscious. This function of the brain continues in sleep, but not with so much force as during wakefulness. The movements of the heart, of the inspiratory muscles, and of other organs which perform either dynamic or secretory functions are all rendered less active by sleep; and during this condition the nervous system generally obtains the repose which its ceaseless activity during our periods of wakefulness so imperatively demands. Sleep is thus necessary in order that the body, and especially the brain and nervous system, may be renovated by the formation of new tissue to take the place of that which by use has lost its normal characteristics. From what has been said it will be seen that the brain is no exception to the law which prevails throughout the whole domain of organic naturethat use causes decay. The following extract from another work bears upon this point, and I think tends to its elucidation. "During life the fluids and tissues of the body are * See the author's Treatise on Hygiene, page 92. |