_Cypher_ instead of a City, and it must be a long Day's Journey to
travel thro' two or three Inches. Fancy in Dreams gives us much such
another Landskip of Life as that does of Countries, and tho' its
Appearances may seem strangely jumbled together, we may often observe
such Traces and Footsteps of noble Thoughts, as, if carefully pursued,
might lead us into a proper Path of Action. There is so much Rapture
and Extasie in our fancied Bliss, and something so dismal and shocking
in our fancied Misery, that tho' the Inactivity of the Body has given
Occasion for calling Sleep the Image of _Death_, the Briskness of the
Fancy affords us a strong Intimation of something within us that can
never die.

'I have wondered, that _Alexander_ the Great, who came into the World
sufficiently dreamt of by his Parents, and had himself a tolerable
Knack at dreaming, should often say, that

'Sleep was one thing which made him sensible he was Mortal.'

I who have not such Fields of Action in the Daytime to divert my
Attention from this Matter, plainly perceive, that in those Operations
of the Mind, while the Body is at rest, there is a certain Vastness of
Conception very suitable to the Capacity, and demonstrative of the
Force of that Divine Part in our Composition which will last for ever.
Neither do I much doubt but had we a true Account of the Wonders the
Hero last mentioned performed in his Sleep, his conquering this little
Globe would hardly be worth mentioning. I may affirm, without Vanity,
that when I compare several Actions in _Quintus Curtius_ with some
others in my own Noctuary, I appear the greater Hero of the two.

I shall close this Subject with observing, that while we are awake we
are at Liberty to fix our Thoughts on what we please, but in Sleep we
have not the Command of them. The Ideas which strike the Fancy, arise
in us without our Choice, either from the Occurrences of the Day past,
the Temper we lye down in, or it may be the Direction of some superior
Being.

It is certain the Imagination may be so differently affected in Sleep,
that our Actions of the Day might be either rewarded or punished with
a little Age of Happiness or Misery. St. _Austin_ was of Opinion, that
if in _Paradise_ there was the same Vicissitude of sleeping and waking
as in the present World, the Dreams of its Inhabitants would be very
happy.

And so far at present