Condescend, sirs, to make my parents sensible of the injustice of an exclusive tenderness, and of the necessity of distributing their care and affection among all their children equally. I am, with profound respect, Sirs,
Your obedient servant,
THE LEFT HAND.
The following essays strikingly illustrate the admirable wisdom and philanthropy of Dr. Franklin; and, if read practically, would, no doubt, greatly lessen the number both of physicians and patients.
THE ART OF PROCURING PLEASANT DREAMS.
As a great part of our life is spent in sleep, during which we have sometimes pleasing, and sometimes painful dreams, it becomes of some consequence to obtain the one kind, and avoid the other; for whether real or imaginary, pain is pain, and pleasure is pleasure. If we can sleep without dreaming, it is well that painful dreams are avoided. If, while we sleep, we can have pleasing dreams, it is so much clear gain to the pleasures of life.
To this end, it is, in the first place, necessary to be careful in preserving health—for, in sickness, the imagination is disturbed; and disagreeable, sometimes terrible ideas are apt to present themselves. But for health, our main dependence is on exercise and temperance. These render the appetite sharp, the digestion easy, the body lightsome, and the temper cheerful, with sweet sleep and pleasant dreams. While indolence and full feeding never fail to bring on loaded stomachs, with night-mares and horrors—we fall from precipices—are stung by serpents—assaulted by wild beasts—murderers—devils—with all the black train of unimaginable danger and wo. Temperance, then, is all-important to sweet sleep and pleasant dreaming. But a main point of temperance, is to shun hearty suppers, which are indeed not safe, even when dinner has been missed; what then must be the consequence of hearty suppers after full dinners? why only restless nights and frightful dreams; and sometimes a stroke of the apoplexy, after which they sleep till doomsday. The newspapers often relate instances of persons, who, after eating hearty suppers, are found dead in their beds next morning.
Another grand mean of preserving health, is to admit a constant supply of fresh air into your chamber. A more sad mistake was never committed than that of sleeping in tight rooms, and beds closely curtained. This has arisen from the dread of night air. But, after all the clamour and abuse that have been heaped on night air, it is very certain that no outward air, that may come in, is half so unwholesome as the air often breathed in a close chamber. As boiling water does not grow hotter by longer boiling, if the particles that receive greater heat can escape; so living bodies do not putrify, if the particles, as fast as they become putrid, can be thrown off. Nature expels them by the pores of the skin and lungs, and in a free open air they are carried off; but, in a close room, we receive them again and again, though they become more and more corrupt. A number of persons crowded into a small room, thus spoil the air in a few minutes, and even render it mortal, as in the black hole at Calcutta. [ [3] ] A single person is said to spoil a gallon of air per minute, and therefore requires a longer time to spoil a chamber full; but it is done, however, in proportion, and many putrid disorders hence have their origin. It is recorded of Methusalem, who, being the longest liver, may be supposed to have best preserved his health, that he slept always in the open air; for when he had lived five hundred years, an angel said to him, "arise, Methusalem, and build thee an house, for thou shalt live yet five hundred years longer." But Methusalem answered and said, "If I am to live but five hundred years longer, it is not worth while to build me an house—I will sleep in the air, as I have been used to do." Physicians, after having for ages contended that the sick should not be indulged with fresh air, have at length discovered that it may do them good. It is therefore to be hoped that it is not hurtful to those who are in health, and that we may be then cured of the acrophobia that at present distresses weak minds, and makes them choose to be stifled and poisoned, rather than leave open the windows of a bed chamber, or put down the glass of a coach.
Confined air, when saturated with perspirable matter, [ [4] ] will not receive more; and that matter must remain in our bodies, and occasions diseases; but it gives some previous notice of its being about to be hurtful, by producing certain uneasinesses which are difficult to describe, and few that feel know the cause. But we may recollect, that sometimes, on waking in the night, we have, if warmly covered, found it difficult to get asleep again. We turn often without finding repose in any position. This fidgetiness, to use a vulgar expression for the want of a better, is occasioned wholly by an uneasiness in the skin, owing to the retention of the perspirable matter, the bed-clothes having received their quantity, and, being saturated, refusing to take any more.
When you are awakened by this uneasiness, and find you cannot easily sleep again, get out of bed, beat up and turn your pillow, shake the bed-clothes well, with at least twenty shakes, then throw the bed open, and leave it to cool; in the meanwhile, continuing undrest, walk about your chamber, till your skin has had time to discharge its load, which it will do sooner as the air may be drier and colder. When you begin to feel the cool air unpleasant, then return to your bed, and you will soon fall asleep, and your sleep will be sweet and pleasant. All the scenes presented by your fancy, will be of the pleasing kind. I am often as agreeably entertained with them, as by the scenery of an opera. If you happen to be too indolent to get out of bed, you may instead of it, lift up your bed-clothes so as to draw in a good deal of fresh air, and, by letting them fall, force it out again. This, repeated twenty times, will so clear them of the perspirable matter they have imbibed, as to permit your sleeping well for some time afterwards. But this latter method is not equal to the former.