Sleep
Sleep is a naturally recurring state characterized by reduced or absent consciousness, relatively suspended sensory activity, and inactivity of nearly all voluntary muscles. It is distinguished from quiet wakefulness by a decreased ability to react to stimuli, and is more easily reversible than being in hibernation or a coma. Sleep is a heightened anabolic state, accentuating the growth and rejuvenation of the immune, nervous, skeletal and muscular systems. It is observed in all mammals, all birds, and many reptiles, amphibians, and fish.
Read more about Sleep.
Famous quotes containing the word sleep:
“Was it for this the clay grew tall?
MO what made fatuous sunbeams toil
To break earth’s sleep at all?”
—Wilfred Owen (1893–1918)
“How gladly would I meet,
Mortality, my sentence, and be earth
Insensible! how glad would lay me down,
As in my mother’s lap! There I should rest,
And sleep secure.”
—John Milton (1608–1674)
“The repose of sleep refreshes only the body. It rarely sets the soul at rest. The repose of the night does not belong to us. It is not the possession of our being. Sleep opens within us an inn for phantoms. In the morning we must sweep out the shadows.”
—Gaston Bachelard (1884–1962)