SLEEP AND DREAMS

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 99, 28 April 1937, Page 6

SLEEP AND DREAMS

In an interesting and instructive address in Nimmo's Hall, yesterday even ing Sister Evans, visiting lecturer on health and psychology, referred to the ancient Greeks describing sleep and dreams as twin sisters, and spoke of sleep as "little death." Another saying attributed to the Greeks, said the lecturer, was that "The night-time of the body was the day time of the soul" Sleep still remained a partial xnyster/ Sleep was simply the withdrawing ot consciousness, and the more intense this withdrawing the sounder the sleep Tt was found that the greater the bra^n development the less sleep was re quired. As people checked up their mode of living and indulged in a correct diet they would find they would be able to reduce their sleeping hours. The greatest torture that could be inflicted'on the human body was to deprive it of its sleep. This was one mode of Chinese torture. Referring to the subject of dreams. Sister Evans remarked that .the ancients believed absolutely in dreams. Many of the prophets of the Bible were interpreters*, notably Danifl, and they were able In tell kings and others high in authority the meaning of their dreams. But it was left for Sigmund Freud, of Vienna, about twenty years ago, to throw s new light on this very old and muchdiscusserl subject, and demonstrate ;i new method. That his solving of the riddle came about through treatment of the sick would appear at first •to have no connection with the well, but Freud's investigations proved that the sick and the well dream in the same way, and use material of the past, though' the interpretations differ with different individuals. The speaker said she did not agree with Freud that all dreams were fulfilments. Many could recall wonderful experiences in dreams, which went to show that there was a real self, besides a "not-self." and that a spiritual eye was operating outside the physical waking. Everyone had dreams, although all might not pwake with the consciousness of having dreamed. The lecturer denounced the use of alarm clocks, which, she said, racked the nervous system and courted nervous disorders.