Читать книгу The psychology of sleep онлайн

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Nourishment, in the form of food, is desirable, but more important still is the sleep when Nature busies herself building new tissue and blood to make good the ravages of fever’s siege. We are careful to keep even good news from the patient, if we have cause to fear that it will prove too stimulating, and everything depressing or alarming is absolutely withheld, because sleep is the paramount need of the depleted body.

We all recognize the value of sleep to the person just past the crisis of a severe illness, and the next thing to learn is that to the person invalided through some less active cause, it is as necessary, and that it may be had.

It may seem an extravagant statement to say that the invalid should be able to summon sleep at will even better than an active, healthy person. But we may see the truth of this statement if we accept Dr. Edward Binns’ assurance that “in no sense can fatigue be said to be the cause of sleep,” so that the usual claim that the sick do not get an opportunity to weary themselves, and so cannot expect sound sleep, cannot be accounted a reason for sleeplessness of the invalid.