Anyone who wishes for improvement in health, strength, grace, ease, or
vitality, or, in fact, in anything, must realize especially the
significance of the law of rhythm.
Rhythm is a law of the whole universe. The music of the spheres is no
fable. Observe, too, the rhythm of the seasons. Everywhere there is a
co-ordination of the finite and the infinite, the individual and the
universal,--a unity of forces acting in a sequence of natural
co-ordinations.
Of all the illustrations of rhythm one of the most important is the
alternation of day and night. Every plant awakes and rejoices with the
sun and it recognizes the sunset and goes to sleep as the darkness
comes. The few exceptions only prove the rule, and even these simply
reverse day and night and are equally rhythmic.
The value of day and night to man is well known. When there is a
continuous work to be done it has been proven scientifically that those
who work at night cannot accomplish so much as those who work by day.
The very same man cannot do the same amount and grade of work in a night
that he can do in a day.
The human system is built up by various rhythms like that of day and
night. There is a natural call for rest, for recuperation and the
surrendering of all our voluntary energies that the spontaneous
activities may have their turn.
The Psalmist, after he has gone all over the beauties of the world
exclaims, "Man goeth forth unto his work and to his labor until the
evening." Here he pauses, for the beauties of the evening seem to awe
him for a moment into silence, and then he breaks forth into a universal
paean of praise: "O, Lord, how manifold are thy works! in wisdom hast
thou made them all."
Night is a part of the normal rhythm of nature. Every plant and every
bird welcomes night as well as morning.
Serious and abnormal, indeed, is the state of one who cannot sleep. Next
to the importance of a right awakening in the morning is the peaceful,
restful retirement at night.
Edison boasts of how little sleep he needs, and claims that sometime man
will cease to sleep. He says that sleep is only a habit.
As a matter of fact, by working rhythmically through all the hours of
the day, by obeying the law of rhythm at all times, a man may possibly
need less sleep, but the repose of unconsciousness seems a part of the
Creator's economy.
"He giveth His beloved sleep."
By living in obedience to the law of rhythm and especially by taking
some rhythmic exercises before lying down, we can sleep better.
Almost innumerable are the suggestions, rules, or recipes on how to go
to sleep.