3.
Once in bed, when it is time to close the five ports
of knowledge, most folks I know seem to find no difficulty
in 
plunging
their earthly parts into oblivion.
It is not so with me, to whom sleep is a coy
mistress, much
given to a teasing inconsistency
and for ever demanding to be
wooed -- "lest
too light winning make the prize light."
I used to read, with wonder, those sycophantic
stories of the warlike
supermen, the great troublers of the world's peace,
Cromwell, Napoleon, and the like, who, thanks to their
"iron wills," could lie down and plunge
themselves immediately into deep sleep, to wake up,
refreshed,
at a given time. Taking these fables to heart, I would
resolve to do likewise, and, going to bed, would clench
my teeth, look as determined as possible in the darkness,
and command the immediate presence of sleep. But alas!
The very act of concentration seemed to make me more
wakeful than ever, and I would pass hours in tormenting
sleeplessness. I had overlooked the necessity of having
an "iron will," my own powers of will having
little or none of this peculiar metallic
quality. But how uncomfortable it must have been living
with these ironwilled folks! Who would want to remonstrate
and argue with them? It would be worse than beating
an anvil
with a sledge-hammer.
I must confess that I always suspect the men who boast
that they unvaryingly
fall asleep as soon as they get into bed -- those
"as soon as my head touches the pillow"
fellows. To me, there is something inhuman,
something callous
and almost bovine,
in the practice.
I suspect their taste in higher
matters. Iron wills apart, there
must be a lack of human sympathy or depth in
a man who can thus throw off, with his clothes, his
waking feelings and thoughts, and ignore completely
those memories and fancies which
...
will sometimes leap,
From hiding-places ten years
deep.
